Learning at Not-School

by Sefton-Green, Julian

• ISBN13: 9780262518246
• ISBN10: 0262518244
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-10-05
• Publisher: Mit Pr

Summary

Schools do not define education, and they are not the only institutions in whichlearning takes place. After-school programs, music lessons, Scouts, summer camps, on-the-jobtraining, and home activities all offer out-of-school educational experiences. In Learningat Not-School, Julian Sefton-Green explores studies and scholarly research onout-of-school learning, investigating just what it is that is distinctive about the quality oflearning in these "not-school" settings. Sefton-Green focuses on those organizations andinstitutions that have developed parallel to public schooling and have emerged as complements,supplements, or attempts to remediate the alleged failures of schools. He reviews salientprinciples, landmark studies, and theoretical approaches to learning in not-school environments,reporting on the latest scholarship in the field. He examines studies of creative media productionand considers ideas of "learning-to learn"-that relate to analyses of language andtechnology. And he considers other forms of in-formal learning--in the home and in leisureactivities--in terms of not-school experiences. Where possible, he compares the findings of US-basedstudies with those of non-US-based studies, highlighting core conceptual issues and identifying whatwe often take for granted. Many not-school organizations and institutions set out to be differentfrom schools, embodying different conceptions of community and educational values. Sefton-Green'scareful consideration of these learning environments in pedagogical terms offers a crucial way tounderstand how they work.