One Reason Adult Learners Struggle with Studying: Time

by Nov 29, 2018Coaching, Education0 comments

Adult learners are busy people. They juggle jobs. Families. Friends. Hobbies. Chores. Commitments of various sorts, etc.

Similar to children in school who do this, with one main difference — time!

Remember when you were back in school (like high school or college), and you still had lots of things to manage to get everything done on time? Remember how you had to leave the same time every day and spend what may have seemed like forever in classes and schedules that were set FOR you, and NOT BY you? You had to show up and study or learn on a schedule that was imposed, often without accounting for anything else you wanted or had to do.

Fast forward to being an adult, and is it any wonder we struggle to find the time to learn? This is why studying, or doing any learning, professional development, or academic activity can be so challenging — it takes time — and as a result we have to carve it into our day. More accurately, we have to MANAGE it into our day.

The problem is really that we were often not taught how to do it! We had to be in school all day, and were taught how to do homework (again, another thing we were forced to do), yet not how to schedule our time to study what we want out of our own inner drive to learn something of interest. Or value.

We never learned how to create and manage the habit of study for our internal needs. Seems simple, though most adults I speak with tell me they wished they have more time to take a class or learn a new language or develop a new skill, but they struggle with other commitments that often appear they need to come first.

Sound familiar?

Adult study habits do not build themselves . . . they take some effort. However, the effort is often not great. Like all habits, they take repetition and a little reward. Something like the satisfaction from learning something new for whatever reason we want to learn it!

So, here is my question — how do you effectively develop and sustain your habit of learning?

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About Me

Jeffrey M. Keefer, Ph.D., is an educational consultant, institutional researcher and accreditation officer in higher education, professor of research methodology, nonprofit capacity building and strategic planning consultant, talent development coach, spiritual life advisor (chaplain) at New York University, spiritual director, and Wikipedian.

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