Learning to change is a unit for people who are interested in learning about making changes in their lives. We think that you will find the unit interesting and that it will give you ideas that are useful for bringing about personal change.
The aims of this section are to:
This unit is based on the assumption that learning and change are features of all our lives, including those of these three people:
I left school w hen I was fifteen and I started work the day after. My qualifications were basically nil. I had no GCSEs. No A levels. I went to secondary modern school and I immediately got myself a job in an office as an office assistant when I left school. Three pounds ten shillings a week was my wage then. My first job was a filing clerk and I actually realised that I didn?t know my alphabet properly, so I actually found a file and I stuck it on the wall. My manager asked me what I was doing at that time and I admitted I was getting a little bit confused. And he said, ‘Well carry on. That?s a good idea.? Oh ? I would rather have the files in the correct order rather than have them wrong!
Figure 1 KarenLong descriptionI left school at the age of sixteen with three basic qualifications ? CSE qualifications, as they were known.
Figure 2 LeveneLong descriptionI left school about sixteen years ago and I left with GCSEs and I was studying A levels which I weren?t up to because I got married. I was supposed to carry on with my studying but I didn?t because my mother-in-law was ill and so I ended up looking after her. And then we moved away and we moved to America for two years. We lived there and so that is why I had to have a break in my studies. And in between that I had my children. And because I was so young I didn?t want to leave them and go back to university. So while they were younger I used to child mind at home with them.
Figure 3 ShehnazLong descriptionThese three stories are the starting point for this unit, Learning to change. Each story says something about real experience in the lives of Karen, Levene and Shehnaz. You will be finding out more about these three people, but this unit is primarily about your experience, particularly your experience of learning. The unite aims to suggest how you can use this experience as a starting point. We think that by getting a clearer picture of your knowledge, skills and qualities you will be able to use learning for personal development and change.
This focus on personal change does make Learning to change quite an unusual unit in some ways. One way to think about this difference is to imagine what you would say if someone asked you what this unit is about. Usually, someone asking this question would be satisfied if you said something like, ‘history? or ‘the environment?. They may be slightly more puzzled if you say that it is about ‘learning? or ‘change?. They may be just as puzzled if you say, ‘it?s about me?. (By the way, we think that all these would be reasonable answers.)
However, in other, important ways, this unit is very much like others. For example, just like other units, it asks you to read and make sense of information. It is also similar to other units because, like them, it asks you to think about what you do in order to develop a deeper understanding. Even the fact that this unit draws on information from different viewpoints is not so different from other units.
The unit offers three sorts of viewpoint for you to explore how you can use learning to achieve personal change:
Although these three viewpoints can be found in all parts of the unit, the balance between them changes as you move through it. The next section sets out the structure of the unit and gives you an indication of these changes.
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