This report describes the general features of "online learning communities," community organizations that have constructed learning delivery systems that effectively combine elements of the distance learning and traditional models of instruction. It discusses the online learning community framework and explains the four features of these…

Teachers transform lives, and the ripple effect goes on for years. Three pertinent questions are asked in this paper: Where does this power come from? What is its source? and What makes teachers so special? Two aspects of these questions are the multiplicity of identities that coexist within each teacher and the passion inside teachers that…

The purpose of this paper is to explore the effects of an alternative, transformative pedagogy that may assist us in responding to the urgent call for changes in the way educational leaders are prepared and developed. Within the contextual loom of preparation programs, the two theoretical perspectives of Transformative Learning Theory and Critical…

School leaders can benefit by considering their faculty as adult learners in transformation while they are learning educational technology. In this article a Journey of Transformation model is presented to assist school leaders in meeting the challenges of the postinformation age. The model is grounded in transformational learning research and…

Can sharing drawings about pedagogical issues develop trust in a mentoring situation? What other themes and feelings emerge when non-traditional forms of mentoring are utilized? During a seven-week student-teaching period, a student art teacher and experienced art teacher drew and wrote in a sketchbook about daily teaching experiences. These…

Seeking to strengthen preparation of preservice general educators for the realities of inclusive school settings, two special education teacher educators from different universities used content-based structured reflective log writing as an integral course requirement. Faced with teaching intensive course content within a limited time frame, the…

Recent discoveries about brain function explain how best practices in adult learning may lead to adult learners' developmental growth.

We discuss the development of an instructional design model, WisCom (Wisdom Communities), based on socio-constructivist and sociocultural learning philosophies and distance education principles for the development of online wisdom communities, and the application and evaluation of the model in an online graduate course in the USA. The WisCom model…

Many adults search for spiritual guidance and direction and persist in seeking answers to life in today's fast-paced world. With burgeoning economic challenges, political corruption, war in Iraq, poverty, health care concerns, environmental concerns, rising fuel costs, violence, racism, and oppression, many adults seek solace and greater…

As faculty director of an undergraduate leadership program that is part of the public policy studies department at Duke University, the author has been developing a pedagogy that introduces students to difficult social issues through community-based internships, and asks them to imagine what kind of leadership it would take to address those issues…

Thich Nhat Hanh, a 76-year-old Buddhist monk of the Vietnamese meditation school, exemplifies mindfulness in his daily life and teaches these principles around the world. Preferring to be called "Thay" which means teacher, he has written over 75 books on such subjects as mindfulness in daily living and its relation to social action. His teachings…

Three presentations are provided from Symposium 17, Transformative Learning, of the Academy of Human Resource Development (HRD) 2000 Conference Proceedings. "Leadership Development as Transformative Pedagogy" (Olga V. Kritskaya, John M. Dirkx) examines the nature of transformative instructional environments, focusing specifically on the…

This article describes the Pathways to Prevention (PTP) infant mental health initiative conducted by Early Head Start (EHS). The authors note that staff members who want to build their early childhood programs' capacity in infant mental health are often at a loss about how to do it. They suggest establishing an intensive, ongoing relationship with…

There is a growing population of young adults who are underserved by community colleges in the United States, students who are poorly prepared for college work and are at risk of poverty, social problems and failure to realize their full potential. Educational programs offered by community colleges represent this group's best hope of overcoming…

Inclusive education is a highly visible yet contentious notion in contemporary education reform because of conceptual, historical and pragmatic reasons. The purpose of this chapter is to examine and expand the evidence on inclusive education, with particular attention to the views of learning that inform this work. The first challenge was to work…