This book provides a fresh look at the question of learner motivation and engagement, beginning with an investigation of potential motivations not to learn, the better to help instructors find more successful ways to engage learners in any given situation. After examining various kinds of resistance to learning, the book goes on to describe effective ways of overcoming resistance and engaging learners.Grounded in the literature of many fields, such as Adult Education, Psychology, Sociology, Cultural Anthropology, and Communication (as well as the author’s own decades of experience), the book connects the concepts surrounding learning resistance directly to engagement and human motivation, drawing these ideas together to make the case for practicing motivational immediacy in all learning spaces. The second section of the book focuses on the various tools effective teachers might use to mitigate learner resistance and foster authentic and lasting engagement. The author devotes a chapter to using curriculum and Instructional Systems Design (ISD) processes to effectively foster engaged learning in different learning spaces and contexts. Two chapters are devoted to applying the theory and methods to specific domains: online learning environments, and face-to-face classrooms with both undergraduate and graduate students. The last section includes a chapter that provides a potential method to measure effectual learning in the classroom, and one that addresses the ethical issues sometimes said to exist in efforts to mitigate learner resistance and foster engagement in its place. The final chapter draws the book to a close by presenting a fluid whole that will greatly improve understanding of the ideas as well as the methods best used to reduce learning resistance, increase learner engagement, and facilitate motivational immediacy and effectual learning.
Jonathan E. Taylor is associate professor in the department of Educational Foundations, Leadership, and Technology, Auburn University, and recent past president of the American Association for Adult and Continuing Education (AAACE). Taylor holds a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Tennessee (with a cognate in Cultural Anthropology). He was previously a state-certified police academy instructor in Virginia, Maryland, and DC, as well as working in a training capacity as a community police officer in charge of community relations. Since then, Taylor has spent over a decade teaching both undergraduate and graduate students in private and public institutions courses in general psychology, developmental psychology, educational psychology, adult education, learning theory, social foundations of education, educational philosophy, and research methods. He has done numerous conference presentations (national and international), keynote presentations, and professional workshops on the topic.
