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Applying Concepts of Adult Education to ImproveWeather and Climate LiteracyDerek S. Arndt a & Daphne S. LaDue aa National Weather Center, Norman, OklahomaPublished online: 15 May 2013.

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APPLYING CONCEPTS OF ADULT EDUCATION TO IMPROVEWEATHER AND CLIMATE LITERACY

Derek S. ArndtOklahoma Climatological Survey

National Weather Center120 David L. Boren Boulevard

Norman, Oklahoma 73072

Daphne S. LaDueCenter for Analysis and Prediction of Storms

National Weather Center120 David L. Boren Boulevard

Norman, Oklahoma 73072

Abstract: The increased importance of climate and climate-change issues has fostered a new emphasis on “climate literacy” for the American and global population. However, because the issue’s acceptance into mainstream discourse is relatively recent, and knowl-edge is rapidly changing, many of the climate-literacy learners who will impact future policy decisions are today’s adults. Many educational theorists have determined that adults have different educational approaches and needs than traditional (“school-age”) learners. This article introduces two major frameworks that inform adult education: andra-gogy and the diffusion of innovations. Each of these frameworks is made up of their own internal assumptions and concepts. These frameworks have been implemented—both intentionally and unintentionally—into climate literacy programs in Oklahoma. We exam-ine the impact of these frameworks on OK-First, a public-safety outreach program that provides education and decision-support for public safety officials who must make deci-sions in the face of hazardous weather or weather-impacted hazards. The application of these adult educational tenets has been an integral part of ongoing efforts to improve the effectiveness of the program. [Key words: adult education, climate literacy, andragogy, diffusion of innovation, hazards.]

INTRODUCTION

Countless weather- and climate-related risk management decisions are made each year, by individuals, institutions, and governments. These decisions, like any decisions, will be informed by potentially competing values and understandings. The decision-maker’s level of climate literacy—particularly in the understanding of a region’s climatic hazards—is certainly an integral part of this process. Recent efforts, such as those that resulted in the developing frameworks Climate Literacy: Essential Principles and Fundamental Concepts (NOAA, 2007) and Essential Princi-ples and Fundamental Concepts for Atmospheric Science Literacy (UCAR, 2008), recognize the need for informed decision making and a climate literate citizenry. The language in these documents clearly emphasizes the need for school-age

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students and their teachers to rise to the challenge of understanding a variable and changing climate.

Focusing efforts only on school-age students, however, would neglect the major-ity of the U.S. population. Because the U.S. Census Bureau (2007) indicates a con-tinued “graying” of the United States population, both in terms of median age and in the number of adults living past 65, it is safe to claim that the majority of mean-ingful climate-related decisions during the next half-century will be made by today’s adults, many of whom are not currently “climate literate” according to NOAA (2007). Today’s decision-makers (the majority of whom are also tomorrow’s decision-makers) face this understanding gap, which is compounded by three other factors. First, there is an expanding sensitivity to climate and climate change in the political and social discussion. In other words, the public discourse has changed in recent years, in part due to electoral issues and reports such as the Fourth Assess-ment Report (FAR) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007). Sec-ond, the scientific understanding of climate mechanisms is expanding rapidly. For example, there are statements of attribution in the FAR that did not exist just five years earlier. Third, there continue to be rapid advances in technology, particularly in the archiving and distribution of information.

In plain language, these factors indicate: (1) that today’s adults are in need of improved climate literacy, for today’s and tomorrow’s decisions; (2) that the scien-tific understanding of climate is a “moving target,” as is the access to information about it. Together, these factors suggest that a substantial, ongoing effort will be crit-ical to help our nation’s adults achieve and update their climate literacy.

This paper is intended to provide some insight into the theory and practice of adult education, which differs from “traditional” (school-age and post-secondary) education in several important ways. These fundamental differences will be intro-duced and discussed. In addition, how and why adults change provides important insights to the practice of adult education and has been proven to help design adult education programs with real outcomes. Finally, some aspects of existing weather and climate literacy programs will be presented as examples of the practice, and challenges, of fusing climate literacy goals with adult education efforts.

WHAT IS ADULT EDUCATION?

Adult education deals with the science, art, and philosophy of the teaching and learning of adults. Like the more traditional notion of education, adult education is a large field that is informed by many disciplines, paradigms, and perspectives (e.g., Elias and Merriam, 1995; Merriam et al., 2007). Each of these multiple frameworks sheds its distinct light upon the understanding of adult learning. Some address the philosophical underpinnings of the field (Why do adults learn? What is worth knowing?); the nature of the learner (What challenges does the adult learner face? What unique advantages does the adult learner present?); and the role of learning in shaping society (Will this learning liberate the learner?). Still others examine the nature of learning itself (How do adults acquire knowledge and make meaning of it? How are these related?).

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With so many perspectives, there are countless options for framing the role of adult education in the context of climate literacy. However, most of these frame-works agree on these fundamental issues: an adult learner is different than a more traditional (“school-age”) learner; the adult learner often enters into a learning situ-ation voluntarily; and the adult learner has a richer reservoir of experience and val-ues from which to draw. We focus on these concepts because we have personally found them useful and because these concepts are strongly congruent with the state of the art in from complementary fields like educational psychology. To that end, we have chosen to frame our discussion of adult learning from the perspectives of andragogy and the diffusion of innovation.

WHAT FACTORS INFLUENCE ADOPTION OF NEW IDEAS ANDCHANGE IN PEOPLE?

Educational models deal with the notion of change. This change can be out-wardly visible, (e.g., changed practices, behaviors, or performance), or more inter-nal (a change in perspective or understanding). In the context of climate literacy, many learners and educational programs face a challenge in both aspects. First, the understanding of the climate system requires the understanding of concepts and issues that are often new and complex for the learner. Furthermore, some of the stated fundamental concepts of climate literacy imply the need for action and change.

How and why adults change has been subject of several decades of research and is an important design consideration for climate literacy programs. While there is much research in this area, one of the most useful constructs for educators to under-stand is how the attributes of a new idea affect whether people adopt it (Rogers, 2003). When the design of educational materials and programs incorporate the rel-ative advantage of a new idea; its compatibility with current practice and values; deal with any complexity that discourages learning or adoption; and allow people to either try or observe the new idea, those programs have been shown to be more effective (e.g., a brief summary of research in all aspects of medicine from patient behavior to physician competence in Davis and Fox, 1994, or Rogers’s, 2003, own summaries of four decades of diffusion research).

Rogers, one of the first diffusion researchers, started his research because he was interested in why cooperative extension services were relatively ineffective at spreading good agricultural practices. Since those early days, diffusion research has extended to just about every field and application imaginable. The research has its roots in sociology because individual decision-making is strongly influenced by one’s social networks. In addition to the ideas in the previous paragraph that affect an individual’s decision-making process, diffusion of innovations is also driven by the characteristics and actions of those designing educational programs.

Learning necessarily involves at least a change in attitudes, skills, and knowl-edge, but programs for adults usually have change in behavior as the ultimate goal. Adults certainly continue to learn for fun, but many programs (like OK-First) are designed, for example, to empower professionals to be more effective in their role. When educators design and deliver educational programs they act as change

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agents. In designing effective programs, educator/change agents often make use of opinion leaders to help encourage that ultimate goal of behavior change. Educa-tional programs are stronger when they make careful use of opinion leaders, or someone who frequently influences others’ attitudes or behaviors.

ADULT EDUCATION IN PRACTICE

Programmatic Application of Adult Education Models in Oklahoma

The basic concepts of andragogy and diffusion of innovation informed the devel-opment and application of adult education programs in Oklahoma, one of which (“Ok-First”) will be used as an example throughout the rest of this article. These pro-grams, as part of their explicit or implicit mission, attempt to build the weather and climate literacy of their “participants,” who are not climate scientists. These partic-ipants include farmers, electric-industry decision-makers, agricultural commodity groups, state and local drought decision-makers, and the like. In some cases, edu-cational concepts were deliberately employed, in others, they were unknowingly applied, and in still others, decisions were made that were perhaps ill-informed.

OK-First (Morris et al., 2001) is designed to help Oklahoma’s public safety offi-cials make better and quicker decisions during weather-impacted situations. Launched in 1996, the program now serves about 450 public safety officials (e.g., emergency management, law enforcement, fire service) in 200 agencies in Oklahoma, and in bordering communities of Arkansas, Kansas, and Texas. OK-First is a decision-support system that combines ongoing, real-time data services (a web-based decision-support system designed around five families of weather and cli-mate hazards), and an educational component. While the two components are inseparable in practice, we focus here on the educational aspect of the program. For more information about OK-First’s technical aspects, please see Arndt and Reader (2006). In 2001, OK-First received the “Innovations in American Govern-ment” award from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. This award recog-nized OK-First as one of the nation’s five most innovative government programs (Altshuler and Behn, 1997).

To enter OK-First, participants must successfully complete a week long “certifi-cation course” that provides a background in weather and climate fundamentals, insight into the forecast and warning process, and familiarity with the program’s technological aspects. To maintain an active status in the program, participants must attend a one-day “recertification” course, which highlights new tools and new procedures, as well as reinforcing concepts introduced in earlier courses, every 18 months.

A central theme in climate and atmospheric science literacy frameworks (NOAA, 2007; UCAR, 2008) is the reciprocity between climate and civilization; that climate impacts and is impacted by humanity. Admittedly, the programs in this paper deal primarily with the impact of climate and weather on decision-making practices, and not vice versa. We also recognize that much of the content of these programs deals with weather literacy as much as climate literacy. Nevertheless, weather and related hazards are components of any location’s climate. We believe that these

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programs’ educational aspects may still inform the practice of adult-education pro-grams that more fully incorporate the total human-climate relationship in their cur-ricula.

Programmatic Details: Themes of Andragogy

Andragogy (Latin: “to lead the man”), a theoretical framework developed by adult educator Malcolm Knowles, has enjoyed several decades as one of the (if not the) primary models for adult education. It is not so much a method for practicing adult education as it is a framework to understand the needs and special consider-ations of adults in the educational setting. Andragogy contrasts with the more famil-iar term pedagogy (Latin: “to lead the child”), in recognizing that adult learners are more independent in their thinking than school-aged learners, and often participate in education to gain even further independence (Knowles et al., 1998).

The “andragogical model” is typically presented as having six major assumptions for understanding the adult learner. Importantly, these assumptions are not exclu-sive of each other; in fact, they overlap significantly. We examine each below, all derived from Knowles et al. (1998). We also provide vignettes that may further illus-trate the concepts introduced by them. They reflect relevant experience gained within the OK-First program and in other climate-services and climate-literacy ini-tiatives in which we have participated. These are written from a more subjective “voice of experience” and are noted as such.

The Need to Know

Adults have a much stronger need than children to ascertain the relevance of their educational activities before they undertake them. In other words, an adult must convince herself or himself—or be convinced—that the educational activity is worthwhile, feasible and a net positive in her/his life.

For OK-First participants, the importance of weather and climate to their field is self-evident. The participants are directly and visibly impacted by weather and climate on a near-daily basis. One needs only to read a story of the latest flood, wildfire, drought, water shortage or severe weather outbreak to know that weather is directly relevant to the partic-ipant’s community. As a decision-maker and safety official within the community, the OK-First participant is often the person that is “on point” to deal with climate hazards.

The educational challenge related to the “Need to Know” concept is to help the participant adopt the stance that she/he can anticipate the development of hazardous weather scenarios, and thus more proac-tively intervene in them; to become more than an observer who reacts to the weather. For some potential participants, this is obvious. For oth-ers, it is a totally new concept. OK-First’s leadership came to appreciate the importance of attending and presenting at professional development

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and other gatherings frequented by public safety personnel. Public safety officials often found participation in OK-First more desirable once they began to accept this more anticipatory role.

The Learner’s Self-Concept

The learner’s view of herself/himself changes with transition into more “adult” learning practices. The adult learner typically accepts responsibility for—and often the direction of—her/his own learning. Even in more formal classroom-and-instructor settings, the adult learner often considers herself/himself to be a collabo-rator, rather than a recipient, in the learning endeavor, and may resent more rigid structures which disallow self-direction (Knowles et al., 1998).

When OK-First participants first enter the course, or when they are faced with new or unfamiliar concepts, they typically need to suspend their independent learning style, and become—temporarily—dependent learners. In other words, early in the workshops, they look to “the instructor” for guidance and direction. However, it is critical that the learners incorporate those thinking skills that will help them continue to grow and self-direct after the initial course is complete.

To that end, each of the “case study” modules presented in OK-First workshops is also developed into a format that allows investigation in a self-directed setting. These often provide the ability to explore a more complete and rich set of data, additional scenarios within the case, and other “what if” arrangements that aren’t practical due to the time con-straints of a workshop. We, like our participants, surrender some of the comfort of immediate feedback and collaboration.

If a participant is particularly interested in a case, if it directly affected their community, or they struggled with it during a workshop, they can revisit it at any time. This self-paced environment allows them to take charge of their own learning situation, away from the prospect of “eval-uation” during the workshops. In short, we try style the cases, and the courses, for that matter, in a way that parallels the learner’s practice, and her/his relationship to the material. This process of trying to converge with a structure that the learner would implement himself/herself never stops.

The Role of Experience

The importance of experience is perhaps the most essential recognition of any adult education theory. Adults come to the learning environment with a vast reser-voir of experience and knowledge from which to draw. This can profoundly inform and impact learning, by providing a strong foundation for the “pinning” of new knowledge to the experience base, values, and preconceptions of learners.

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Cognitive science supports and expands this notion through research about how knowledge is organized and how memories activate. In a learning situation with adults, memories of the learning are strongest when the learning is deep and mean-ingful, tied in to existing knowledge as much as possible. When new knowledge is specifically tied into existing knowledge used during real life situations, memory from that learning is more likely to trigger (i.e., to come to mind when needed in those real-life situations).

Sometimes concepts must be learned that form a basis for the application of the knowledge. One effective way to draw upon, and celebrate, the learner’s experi-ence is through metaphor and analogy. By linking real, experienced events with new concepts, the learner can begin to make the cognitive connections necessary to activate the new knowledge when relevant to the job.

To help learners understand a new concept important to interpretation of velocity information from Doppler radar, OK-First uses a familiar analogy. The notion of a phase shift in electromagnetic frequency due to relative motion does not appeal to the experience of most public safety personnel. However, most of them have experienced the change in pitch of a race car passing a microphone during a televised stock car race. Others may have experienced the change in the sound of a locomotive whistle as a train approaches, then passes. We lead with these exam-ples. While neither of these examples deals with electromagnetic waves, they are tangible examples of the distortion of sound waves that can be related to the more obscure radar phenomenon. Taking analogies fur-ther, many understand the physics of radar used for traffic control, in that the speed gun must be aimed directly at the approaching car in order to measure the full speed of the car. Likewise, Doppler radars only mea-sure the full speed of motion directly toward or away from the radar.

To help learners anchor new knowledge into their real life roles, we often use case studies. In the case studies, we illustrate the convergence of weather or climate “ingredients” for a particular hazard and we build the cases upon large-scale or memorable weather and climate events whenever possible. In many cases, the situations we use are typically available in the memories of our participants. They can, and are encour-aged to, draw upon their recalled observations and experiences when “walking through” the case.

In our drought-monitoring tools, we introduced “analog seasons” as a method of comparing the current drought situation with prior experi-ence. This may help the user/learner frame the current situation in the context of prior decision-making on the individual or organizational level.

It should be noted that, while learner experience often informs their learning, it may not always facilitate quicker or more effective learning. Sometimes, prior

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experience can represent an obstacle to learning. The learner’s experience can interfere cognitively (conflicting experience or existing misconceptions) or emo-tionally (e.g., making her/him resistant to the learning opportunity). In such instances, the interference must be addressed in order for new learning to stick.

Readiness to Learn

An adult’s willingness to learn depends largely on the readiness to learn. Adults are less likely to participate in educational activities that are “out of sync” with their life role or perceived abilities. An adult is ready to learn when they know they need new knowledge or skills in order to effectively cope with real-life responsibilities. In some cases, readiness can be encouraged through making clear why the adult needs to know something (see first item of andragogy) or by being mindful of how the attributes of an innovation affect its adoption.

During the program’s early years, we often “led with the weather,” and dove directly into the weather and climate aspects of the hazard. Over time, we learned that it was more effective to “set the scene” with our case studies. For example, a recent module that deals with drought and fire weather begins with role playing (“You are the emergency manager for Stephens County”). We then walk through a week that is well-known to public safety personnel as a disastrous week of wildfire outbreaks, except that we retain the Stephens County viewpoint the entire time. The two-day case features a high-threat “nonevent” (wildfire danger was extreme, but no fires were reported in Stephens County), followed by a “bad day” (several fires). This is congruent with the public safety offi-cial’s experience, in which threats are common but actual events are not.

Orientation to Learning

Adult learners typically approach educational activities that are problem- rather than concept-based. In other words, most adult learners will have little patience for learning activities that have little practical application. In the context of climate lit-eracy, this concept often manifests as “personalizing” aspects of climate as some-thing we need to solve. When framed in this perspective, the learner may see the utility in pursuing a deeper understanding of the phenomenon.

OK-First instructors often struggle during their first months with the pro-gram because they are—very naturally—inclined to approach their ses-sions as if they were teaching developing meteorologists. They adopt a very formal approach and are extremely sensitive to the details and der-ivations of the content. This attention to detail, and the formality in which it is presented, can become an obstacle to effective teaching and learning. Successful instructors realize that they are teaching meteorol-ogy to members of another profession, and this is an important

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distinction. This same progression is evident at the program level, as well. During the early years, instructional objectives were based upon, and divided into, content sections. Participants learned “basics” and “tools” and “concepts” before they moved on to actually applying them to a case. Over time, we realized that the “real-world” application of this knowledge was highly integrated, so the content now matches. We employ case studies much earlier in the course, and provide a more recursive approach, revisiting more complex material multiple times during the course.

An example of personalizing climate comes from our local electric cooperative. To help educate members about the impact of energy con-sumption, they have launched educational campaigns and given out conservation items. Most recently, the Oklahoma Electric Cooperative gave members attending the annual meeting an energy kit containing several items including a compact fluorescent light bulb and a low-flow showerhead. A booklet contained in the kit explained how each item would likely impact their electric bill when used in the home.

Motivation

A critical component of an adult’s approach to learning is what motivates the learning experience. Some motivators for education are external (e.g., the desire for a promotion), while others are more internal (e.g., becoming a more able profes-sional, closing the gap between what the learner is and “can be”). Adults who are strongly internally motivated typically undergo deeper and more sustained learn-ing. Adults have a strong, internal desire to be good at what they do, have a good quality of life, strong self-esteem, and more.

In OK-First, we have tried to appeal to both aspects of motivation. We have found, through observation, and some survey work, that most of our incoming participants enter the program to “be a better emergency manager” or more effectively carry out their role in the community. As a participant sees the gap between her/his current performance, and what can be achieved with a more thorough understanding (and application) of weather and climate principles, he/she may become even more moti-vated by the potential of participation.

However, external motivation is a legitimate aspect, especially in the decision to enter the program (versus persist in it). To appeal to more external factors, we recently acquired accreditation from the law enforcement and fire service communities. By completing our work-shops, our participants can apply their credit hours to their profession’s continuing education requirements.

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Programmatic Details: Encouraging People to Change

The andragogical model emphasizes mostly internal factors to the individual that affects learning for an adult. Andragogy also emphasizes that ultimately, education is designed to empower people to follow their life goals and fulfill their life roles—in other words, to change. Adult educators have found the diffusion of innovation model extremely helpful in expanding understanding of adult learning to factor in how change is influenced by one’s social environment.

Regarding individual decision-making, the thousands of diffusion-related studies have come to a consensus summary of how innovative people are in a general sense (Rogers, 2003). A small percentage of the population (referred to as innova-tors) is quick to adopt new ideas. A slightly larger percentage are on the opposite end, and are very slow to change, or may never change. The rest represent a major-ity of learners—approximately 68%—and need a bit more before deciding to adopt. For them, an educational program designed to incorporate factors that encourage adoption makes all the difference and helps them to change more quickly than they normally might. An adult educator’s job is to move people toward change through well-designed educational programs that take into account both adult learning principles and an understanding of the factors that affect the adop-tion of new ideas, or change.

Over 40+ years of research based upon the diffusion of innovations model have shown there are five factors that affect how readily a new idea is accepted. The first two factors—relative advantage and compatibility—are particularly critical to con-sider before designing any educational program. The second two—complexity and trialability—are particularly important considerations during the design phase. Observability might be addressed at the outset of an educational program because it can affect several factors in andragogy: readiness to learn, internal motivation, and the need to know.

Relative Advantage

In order to be adopted, some new idea or action must have a relative advantage over current ideas or actions. A relative advantage is often economic or social. Is the new idea a more efficient way to do something? Would the new idea bring increased social status?

OK-First provides emergency managers a relative advantage in perform-ing their jobs. It helps them stay ahead of the weather rather than simply react to it. For example, monitoring surface winds and changes therein have helped emergency managers be proactive in fighting wildfires and protecting firefighters’ lives.

A special note here is that research shows that preventive innovations, that is, actions that would prevent a future event, are adopted very slowly. For preventive innovations, the relative advantage may be unclear or weak compared to the disad-vantage of adopting the innovation. For example, many climate change mitigation

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actions that an individual might take are costly up front. Even the relative personal advantage might come years or decades later in reduced costs and the relative soci-etal benefit may be even less tangible, particularly if the innovation does not become widespread.

Compatibility

New ideas must also be compatible with existing needs, experiences, and val-ues. A new way to forecast heavy snow may have a clear relative advantage over an older technique, but may take too long to perform operationally. Sometimes a new idea is disruptive to current systems. One example would be home power genera-tion. Utilities are unlikely to encourage home power generation because their busi-ness model is built upon centralized power generation (Kaplan, 1999).

Some emergency managers are less integrated into local governing structures than others. When they learn about ways to mitigate impacts of weather, they may need additional help in the form of strategies and ideas about how to make change happen. OK-First participants become part of a community where they can learn how others have effectively integrated weather mitigation into their local communities.

Complexity

The more complex an innovation, the slower the rate of adoption. Complexity is probably less important than relative advantage and compatibility (Rogers, 2003), but can have a significant impact. Rogers’s example was the initial use of home computers. Early computers were mainly adopted by engineers, scientists, and other individuals with a technological bent. Once computers became more user-friendly, the rate of adoption increased.

When the OK-First program first started, computers were relatively rare in emergency manager’s offices. At first, the OK-First orientation course had to be longer in order to teach many basics of computer use. Now that computers have become ubiquitous in the emergency manager’s office, much of that complexity is gone.

Trialability

Being able to experiment with an innovation on a limited basis helps encourage adoption. In an educational setting, trialability could be in the form of a case study or simulation.

Simulations are powerful ways to allow learners to both integrate ideas into a realistic work context while also allowing them opportunity to try and gain feedback on how the new idea might work for them.

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Observability

The concept of observability refers to how well others can see the results or outcome of an innovation. Positive outcomes that are easily seen encourage adoption. Some innovations, like cell phones and flash drives, are highly visible while the outcomes of other innovations, like wearing a seatbelt, are difficult to observe.

By the end of the first workshop experience, OK-First participants are well-versed in the history of successful applications of OK-First, such as the life-saving decisions during the May 3, 1999 tornado outbreak and many other examples. We also encourage them to submit their exam-ples of OK-First “success stories,” which we will publish on the pro-gram’s web page. We do not do this just for the public relations benefit of our program and its participants. These cases, to our participants, are examples of when someone “just like me” made an exemplary judg-ment which paid off for the participant and the community. If the Cordell, OK fire chief can use a wind shift to extinguish a fire when undermanned, maybe I can too.

CONCLUSION

Now that the science of climate change has matured to a point where the link-ages between human activities and climate are clear, it is vital that the general pop-ulation becomes more climate literate. Individual, corporate, and government decision-making in the face of a changing and sensitive climate can best be informed by successful educational and outreach efforts designed to facilitate such decisions.

A person is more likely to change when he/she sees a relative advantage to new ideas and those ideas are compatible with his/her current values, needs, and expe-riences. Likewise, when they clearly understand why they need to know something, they have better motivation and interest in learning. When ideas are particularly complex, it is especially important to draw upon an adult’s experience as a resource for learning.

The most effective education programs for adults consider both the uniqueness of how the adult approaches learning situations and why adults change. In this paper we illustrated how the OK-First program for public safety and emergency management personnel evolved over the years to increasingly take these principles into account. We now recognize the helpful impact of applying these concepts to educational programs such as OK-First, and we recommend that physical geogra-phers, with other climate scientists and professionals, incorporate them more fully into the design and delivery of their programs.

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WEATHER AND CLIMATE LITERACY 499

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