Autonomous Learning

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Introduction 

The Importance of Autonomous Learning

Background

Introduction

Autonomous Learning means that the person is responsible for its own learning process. The learning depends on the person  and the responsibility for learning what he or she wants to accomplish. We cannot say that there is a special way of learning because each person has his or her own style. It depends on what the person wants to learn and how the goal wants to be achieved. An example of this is my uncle Manolo. He learned English on his own. He just wanted to learn because he started in Costa Rica an agency called Manolo´s Tour. What is important about this? The first thing is that he needed English for his agency. This means that the person needs to have an interest to learn something or about something. Then he started having his benefits with his business.it was nice 

What is autonomous  learning? 

     When people get in charge of their own learning is what is known as autonomous learning. To achieve the goal, people need to be responsible of their own learning. This means that the person who has decided to  learn something without help needs to have a big desire to do it. The learners will have to study , investigate, set goals chooses materials, methods and tasks. After doing all these , the learner need to have enough criteria to evaluate themselves.

For a definition of autonomy, we might quote Holec (1981: 3, cited in Benson & Voller, 1997: 1) who describes it as ‘the ability to take charge of one’s learning’. On a general note, the term autonomy has come to be used in at least five ways (see Benson & Voller, 1997: 2):

a)      for situations in which learners study entirely on their own;

b)      for a set of skills which can be learned and applied in self-directed learning;

c)      for an inborn capacity which is suppressed by institutional education;

d)      for the exercise of learners’ responsibility for their own learning;

e)      for the right of learners to determine the direction of their own learning.

The Rise of Autonomy in Language Education

A Brief History

The early history of autonomy in language education is well documented (Gremmo & Riley 1995; Little1991, 2000a; Benson 2001; Holec 2007). In brief,it begins with the Council of Europe’s Modern Languages Project, which led to the publication of Holec’s (1981), in which autonomy was defined as ‘the ability to take charge of one’s own learning’ (p. 3). Important work from this period can also be found in early issues of the journal Melanges Pedagogiques

and in papers presented at a 1976 seminar at the University of Cambridge (Harding-Esch 1977).

Early pedagogical experiments related to autonomy were inspired by humanistic expectations aroused by the political turmoil and “counter-cultures” of late-1960s Europe (Holec 1981; Gremmo & Riley1995).

Practical applications focused on self-directed learning and led to the development of self-access centres and learner training as focal points forexperimentation. Although Holec (1981) treated autonomy as an attribute of the learner, the term was also used to describe learning situations. In his book on self-instruction, Dickinson (1987: 11), for example, described autonomy as “the situation in which the learner is totally responsible for all of the decisions concerned with his learning and the implementation of those decisions”. As Allwright (1988: 35) put it, the idea of learner autonomy was for a long time “associated with a estructuring of language pedagogy” that involved “the rejection of the traditional classroom and the introduction of new ways of working”.

In other words many of the early experiments were designed for adults who did not necessarily have the time, inclination or opportunity to attend classroom based courses. For Allwright, however, autonomy needed to be re-conceptualized if it was to be applied to the classroom.

Autonomy could, for example, be recognized in students “ unpredictable contributions to classroom activities that could temporarily throw the teacher’s plans. In his book on learner training, Dickinson (1992) also argued that learners often acted  independently, both cognitively and behaviourally, in the classroom, while Dam (1995) demonstrated how principles of autonomy could be integrated into secondary school classrooms without self-access or formal learner training. This turn towards classroom applications led a second wave of interest in autonomy in the 1990s, with important theoretical implications.

 Little’s (1991) book on learner in                                                                                                           autonomy, for example, emphasized the psychological attributes of autonomous learners and

prioritized ‘interdependence’ over ‘independence’ in learning. In an early paper on teacher autonomy, Little (1995) argued that learner autonomy did not imply any particular mode of practice, but was instead dependent upon the quality of the pedagogical dialogue’ between teachers and learners.

First, learners need to become aware of the ways they learn best, which involves their learning styles and strategies (Brazis, Kavaliauskienë, 2000). Naturally, it takes time for learners to find out what are the most effective techniques and activities for each person.

Second, learners have to change their passive attitude to learning to a more active attitude, i.e. to become less dependent on the teacher and take charge of their own learning (Wilga M. Rivers, 1992). Teacher's role is to involve students in search for interesting materials, e.g. surfing the Internet, or finding pen-friends on the Internet, taking part in competitions, chat-clubs, encouraging to read English books, newspapers, magazines, etc.

Finally, learners have to be given a chance to gain experience in 'swapping places' with a teacher, which means changing the traditional role of a teacher, developing the art of negotiation, emphasizing the importance of self-assessment, etc. (Grudzinska, 2000). This involves tasks and activities designed and administered by the learners themselves. The diversity of tasks may cover grammar, games, written work, audio- and video- recordings, news items, translation -- you name it -- anything that interests learners will benefit them.