Non-Academic Media Portrayal Of Adult Learners And Learning Situations Essays Examples

The educational level of the adult learners is the continuous participation in educational learning. The higher the educational level of the adult learners results in the higher engagement in additional educational and learning activities. According to Knowle on his famous statement that, the adult learners are extremely independent and they have the inherent maturity level to direct and guide themselves in the learning process to achieve their objectives. A simple question ‘how the media affect learning?’ can inform the public and explore questions that are more complex. The complex questions, ‘what are the actual and potential relationships between the media and learning?’ and ‘can people create strong and convincing influence on learning through improved research, theories, and instructional design?’ The non-academic media portrayal of adult learners and learning situations can surely address some issues in learning. The movie is one of the non-academic media entertainments that have a strong influence on the public viewers. The increasing interest of the public in movies influences educational and learning activities. Consequently, media has the tendency to reproduce and challenge the structural power relations that are based on gender, race, class, and orientation in the characters’ portrayal. The learners are considered as direct consumers of the entertainment media that serve as a way to construct their knowledge. The non-academic media portrayal of adult learners and learning situations provide positive and negative outcomes; it leads to some misconceptions, interpretations, and descriptions that influence the individuals and challenges them how to promote adult learning effectively.
The movie entitled “Stand and Deliver” portrayed different angles of educational and learning activities. The movie is an example of a non-academic media that the actors portray different characters culturally. The characters of the movie mainly portrayed as learners of the different level such as young and adult learners, respectively. Though the movie is a non-academic media entertainment, it strongly influenced the viewers; it contributed positive and negative portrayals in learning.
In the educational perspectives, the high school students in Garfield High School, the movie depicted courage and determination to learn difficult topics in mathematics especially calculus. Most of the students in the school belonged to certain communities, Latin-Americans and they belonged to the lower class in school. The portrayals of the faculty members depicted how they support their students to strive more and the teachers learned themselves to consider the individual conditions of the students and their families. For example, the mathematics teacher devoted his time to teaching the students, motivated them that people will change for the better, and guided the students every step of the way despite his health condition. In addition, the teacher demonstrated total concern to the students by visiting them at home and talked to their parents. The mathematics teacher also helped the adult learners in the community on how to speak American English since most of the people are speaking Mexican language. The viewers can easily interpret and describe positively the portrayals of the characters in the movie. The non-academic media strongly influenced the learners to reflect that education is very important personally and in the entire community.
On the contrary, the movie has negative portrayals for the viewers. For example, some students portrayed notorious acts that can influence the minds of the viewers that it is normal to bully their classmates and teachers in school. Another scenario, a father casually and strongly disagreed with the teacher that education cannot make them rich and famous. The misconceptions in the movie totally focused on the real scenarios happening in every community in the past and present situations. In some way, it linked to the relevance of teaching diversity and equity to the learners in the community. Adult education provides a framework for critical media literacy through wide exploration of the entertainment media on how it affects the thinking of the learners about group identities and how it draws the way they see teaching and learning in their level. However, these negative portrayals in the movie still can lead to positive learning. In the end, one of the members of the notorious students devoted his life as an achiever and the resistant parent realized that his daughter has the potential to excel in school. In general, the movie has more positive portrayals than its counterparts do.
Considering the media portrayals, it perfectly aligned with the research data. Most specifically, the movie depicted the influences and challenges of the learners. The nature and purpose of the movie to the young and adult learners in the community have the educational and learning activities. The healthy signs of showing the importance of education as it reach out every individual in the society to enhance the skills and to address the barriers to learning. The media portrayals have its differences based on gender, race, class, and orientation in the characters. In general, the movie entitled “Stand and Deliver,” emphasized the images and values of the dominant way of life. For example, one of the scenarios featured characters that represent the real norms and values in the community, at school, at home, and at work. The characters in the movie are mostly Mexicans; the adults are married, family-oriented, middle, upper, and heterosexual classes, traditional or stereotypical roles in terms of gender, race, and class. In terms of gender, males portrayed strong personalities than females.
Basically, learners differ in dealing with issues in the school and at home, for example, males portrayed firm decisions to face challenges than females do. However, in the movie, both the male and female portrayals demonstrated how sacrifices can change the life of the individuals better through the assistance of their teacher. For many students, as learners, physically and mentally, they participated and committed to their studies. The learners’ intellectual competence and skills were challenged to reach the profound sense of fulfillment. The character portrayals of the students described the quality of life and self-confidence with personal and social values. In connection with the research data, adult learning provided academic advice to the learners who seek knowledge or idea from them. The non-academic media such as the movie “Stand and Deliver” provided the clear perspective of learning to the young and especially the adult learners. The mathematics teacher faced the challenges to foster adult learning by teaching them with passion and integrity.
It is necessary to be aware of the information about the non-academic media portrayal of adult learners and learning situations. The actual and potential relationships between media and learning should be understood thoroughly. Through a thorough understanding, viewers can see the fundamental connection. Generally, the failure to observe the connection is the failure to reveal the research, theories, and design hindered by technology. The ideas of the traditional instructional model and the comparative media study are dependent on the standard that, media stimuli are described only as the exterior features of technology and the effect of learning is measured through the viewers’ behavioral responses. However, today, people understand that learning is not a simple passive response to the delivery of the instructions; learning is constructive, active, social, and cognitive processes. Strategically, the learners can manage to understand the resources available to create new ideas from the gathered information and they can integrate the information better.
The awareness of the information is associated with the new ideas and the learning as a reciprocal connection between the cognitive resources and the external environment. In addition, the connection of the non-academic media portrayal and the learners is influenced by the internal and external resources combined together. As a result, to understand the role of non-academic media portrayal of adult learners and learning situations, viewers should understand first the positive and negative outcomes. Deep understanding can avoid unnecessary misconceptions or interpretations; instead, the good descriptions that influence the behavioral responses or challenges of the adult learners to promote adult learning through non-academic media portrayals successfully.

Reference

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Ramón Menéndez, T. M. (Writer), & Menéndez, R. (Director). (1988). Stand and Deliver
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