K Balasubramanian

Using mobile phones to promote lifelong learning among rural women in Southern India

This article is an attempt to study the role of mobile phones in the non‐formal and informal context among rural women from resource poor communities. In particular, it focuses on the womens control over the mobile phone as a learning tool through the domestication of technologies. The distance learning, gender dimensions, and use of technologies have been analysed vis‐à‐vis the concept of social capital. The article demonstrates that the transition from powerlessness to empowerment is possible in non‐formal learning settings and low‐cost technologies offer means to accelerate this process in the context of social capital.

Lifelong learning to empowerment: beyond formal education

Abstract This paper discusses the relevance of lifelong learning vis-à-vis the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and stresses the need for an approach blending formal education, non-formal and informal learning. The role of Open and Distance Learning (ODL) in moving beyond formal education and the importance of integrating pedagogy, andragogy and heutagogy in lifelong learning are raised as key factors in ensuring that education and learning can generate positive externalities and impact livelihoods. Through a case study in the agricultural sector, this paper analyses the role of lifelong learning in empowering smallholders of backyard poultry enterprises in Kenya and argues that lifelong learning needs to be placed in appropriate social and economic contexts to generate outcomes and impacts such as empowerment.

Mobile based learning for sustainable livelihoods: gender and pedagogy in the Life Long Learning for Farmers programme in India

Mobile phone, a modern communication tool, is becoming ubiquitous, plugging a large mass into a system of interactive communication. This results in people in lower socio-economic categories having independent access to information and a better communication network. Increasingly mobile phone has been used as a tool to deliver information to farmers, often without considering their learning mode and processes to convert the information into knowledge and then to practice. This paper intends to show how mobile phones can be used as an effective learning tool when appropriately placed in the social and livelihood context of the users. It further elaborates on how the pedagogy was planned to facilitate the learning process among women farmers to improve their livelihoods. The Life Long Learning for Farmers programme was started in 2009–10 in Theni, district of Tamil Nadu, India and this paper is based on the programme implemented in Theni district among dairy and goat rearing women farmers.

Learning through social media: a Promethean gift?

In the last two decades, social media has become a powerful communication tool, utilised by billions of people worldwide (We are Social and Hootsuite in Digital in 2017: Global Overview, 2017). Both its promise and potential negative impacts have been discussed widely in academia as well as in popular media. Studies show that social media has the potential to offer an alternative pedagogical approach in integrating formal and informal learning and can enhance self-regulated learning among students in formal education. However, there has been a dearth of studies on the role of social media in non-formal learning-particularly in the agricultural sector-in developing countries. The present exploratory study was conducted in Tamil Nadu, India, amongst a large number of farmers who are using Facebook to learn about agricultural practices. A mixed methods approach was utilised, and survey data was collected from 386 respondents, while semi-structured interviews and observations were conducted with 10 farm households. The paper explores social media as a tool for a heutagogical approach which can help strengthen lifelong learning among farmers. The paper also warns that social media can get subsumed by social differentiation, such as gender and class, if adequate precautions are not undertaken in its design and use as a learning tool.