First Stages of Adult Students Relationship to Scientific Knowing and Research in the Open University's Web-Based Methodology Course

Abstract

The adult students who participate in the web-based studies of the open university have in many ways heterogeneous starting points for studying and learning, for example, the educational backgrounds, the acquired work experience, the general academic skills and the objectives of the future can vary considerably. The adult students striving from the different starting points pursue their own individual objectives and the set educational dimensions of the academic education. In the academic adult education, individuality and the adult student's autonomy are emphasized and at the same time, diverse knowledge, skills and understanding are sought after. One key objective of the higher education is the development of the scientific thinking and refining of personal epistemology and the readiness for their complementary reflection. The personal relationship of an adult student to the scientific knowledge and, at the same time, the academic identity are based dialogically and process-like in the dynamic and complex interaction field of cognitive, emotional and social factors. The adult student's genuine and profound learning experience touches personal epistemology and is strongly connected to the individual's meta-cognitive and cognitive processes. Furthermore, the feelings which are related to the adult student's study and the social life field are involved in the process. In our article we examine the open university's adult students' personal relationship to science and to scientific knowledge which is structured gradually and in a process-like fashion. The examination adheres to the situation at the beginning of the open university e-learning course in qualitative methodology and on the students' own reflection. We focus the examination on those adult students who did not have earlier experience of carrying out research or of the methodology of qualitative research when the course in qualitative methodology began. The research material consists of the learning diaries the students (N= 41) kept during the course, the diaries which were also a part of the course work. From the material, five different personal, academic science relationships crystallize through a material based content analysis: outsider, superficial, timid, critical realist and user of the expert knowledge. Finally we present e-pedagogical conclusions as a summary of how the adults' learning process can be supported when aiming for the thinking which integrates personal everyday knowledge and scientific knowledge and how the commitment to the development of one's own thinking can be reinforced.