INFORMAL LEARNING

CONTEXTS
ATHIRA MOHAN B M
INTRODUCTION
As students most of us enjoyed the opportunities to step
outside the classroom for a day filled with new places to
visit and fun filled activities.Outside the school there are
many opportunities to participate in science related
experiences.Informal education is composed of an
individual’s environment in an unplanned unscheduled
and uncontrolled way sometimes even more efficient
than formal learning in the process of gaining new
behaviours.
WHAT IS INFORMAL LEARNING?
Informal learning are typically places where learning takes place outside of a
formal classroom possibly in
museums,parks,zoos,playground,exhibitions,fairs etc.
EXAMPLES
PARKS
MUSEUMS
HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
PLAYGROUND
PLANETARIUM
ANERT
FIELD VISIT
EXHIBITION
FAIR
QUIZ
 PARKS
An area of open space provided for recreational use.
ADVANTAGES
Parks offer children the daily benefits of direct experience
with nature.
Parks offer children a sense of place,self identity and
belongingness.
 Parks engage children in informal experimental learning through play and
shared experiences with peers.
Parks provide valuable resource for closing the educational achievements
gap in communities.
 MUSEUMS
Museums are packed with objects stories ideas that
facilitates the voluntary learning of a variety of cognitive
skills such as divergent thinking,critical analysis,better
understanding of the natural world.
ADVANTAGES
Museums provide an effective way of learning.
Museums help in bringing change and development to
the communities.
Museums are the next community partner or business
endeavour.
 
 HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
A historical monument is a rich source of History.It gives us
a sense of wonder and makes us curious to know more about
past connected with it.
ADVANTAGES
Historical monuments provide a setting for a great variety
of local activities.
It gives us a long term view of social and environmental
change.
Historical characters are not only attractive but it acts as
a catalyst for creating new designs.
Historical environment provides focus and resource for lifelong learning about
human past.
They are popular place for recreation attracting local people and visitors.
 PLAY GROUNDS
Children are experts at play. Through play they interact with
others and experience the world around them.It is essential
for the physical social and mental development of the child.
ADVANTAGES
They develop social skills to cooperate collaborate
communicate share and empathize with others.
They become creative about what and how games
are played.
Playgrounds asses risks and tackle new challenges
among children by developing thinking and problem
solving capacity.
Children master new skills and play with others which develop competence
and confidence.
 PLANETARIUM
Planetarium is a learning environment or a theatre where live
and pre recorded programs are presented to introduce the
concept of earth and space science or for training in
celestial navigation.
ADVANTAGES
Select realistic goals and effective teaching techniques
for students.
Involve students in active investigation during
planetarium programs.
Students acquire perspective interests and learning abilities.
 ANERT
It is the agency for non conventional energy
and rural technology.It deals with many ways
through which people of India are interacting
with one another by sharing thoughts and
ideas and environmental issues in general.
ADVANTAGES
Conservation and preservation of natural
environment.
Deforestation and re-afforestation.
Sustainability of small scale rural industries using bio
mass fuel.
 FIELD VISIT
A field trip or excursion is a journey by a group of people
to a place away from their normal environment.
The purpose of the trip is usually observation for education,
non-experimental research or to provide students with experiences
outside their everyday activities, such as going camping with teachers
and their classmates.
The aim of this research is to observe the subject in its natural state and
possibly collect samples.
Field trips are most often done in 3 steps: Preparation, Activities and Follow-up
activity. Preparation applies to both the student and the teacher. Teachers
often take the time to learn about the destination and the subject before the
trip. Activities that happen on the field trips often
include: lectures, tours, worksheets, videos and demonstrations.
Follow-up activities are generally discussions that occur in the classroom once
the field trip is completed.
 EXHIBITION
An exhibition, in the most general sense, is an organised
presentation and display of a selection of items. In practice,
exhibitions usually occur within a cultural or educational setting
such as a museum, art gallery, park, library, exhibition hall, or
 world's fairs.
Exhibitions can include many things such as art in both major museums and
smaller galleries, interpretive exhibitions, natural history museums and history
museums, and also varieties such as more commercially focused exhibitions
and trade fairs.
In British English the word "exhibition" is used for a collection of items placed on
display, and the event as a whole, which in American English is usually an
"exhibit". In both varieties of English each object being shown within an exhibition
is an "exhibit".
In common usage, "exhibitions" are considered temporary and usually scheduled
to open and close on specific dates.
TYPES
ART EXHIBITIONS
INTERPRETIVE EXHIBITIONS
COMMERCIAL EXHIBITIONS
DIGITAL EXHIBITIONS

FAIR
A fair (archaic: faire or fayre), also known as a funfair, is a
gathering of people for a variety of entertainment or commercial
activities. It is normally of the essence of a fair that it is
temporary with scheduled times lasting from an afternoon to
several weeks.
TYPES
STREET FAIR
FÊTE(AN ELABORATE FESTIVAL, PARTY,
OR CELEBRATION.)
FESTIVAL
COUNTRY FAIR OR AGRICULTURAL SHOW
STATE FAIR
TRADE FAIR
TRAVELING CARNIVAL
TRAVELING FUNFAIR
 QUIZ
A quiz is a form of game or mind sport, in which the players (as individuals or in
teams) attempt to answer questions correctly. It is a game to test your
knowledge about a certain subject. In some countries, a quiz is also a
brief assessment used in education and similar fields to measure growth in
knowledge, abilities, and/or skills.
Quizzes are usually scored in points and many quizzes are designed to
determine a winner from a group of participants – usually the participant with
the highest score.
 ADVANTAGES OF INFORMAL
LEARNING
LESS EXPENSIVE
Informal learning saves money because you don’t need instructional designers to
create content. It also saves time, because it happens naturally rather than at a
set time in a set location.
VARIED LEARNING SOURCES
Instructional designers will draw on their subject matter experts to create
effective training content, but through informal learning you can utilise the
expertise of everyone within the business! This will help you to uncover hidden
experts who don’t have the opportunity to share their knowledge within a formal
learning programme.
CLEARER PICTURE
Informal learning experiences will help you to fully understand and improve their
training. As emerging technologies like xapi and cmi5 grow in prominence, it will
become easier for formal and informal learning to be captured and tracked from
one place.
 DISADVANTAGES OF INFORMAL
LEARNING
No one (fellow students or teachers/professors) to bounce your
ideas of, to get feedback so you can ensure you’re developing in
the right direction.
No challenges or corrections so you can grow. It is found that most
people are way too uncritical of their own bias, or the bias or
trustworthiness of a source they are using.
No interaction socially with other academic people (students &
professors) to stretch you, aid you in understanding others from
very different backgrounds than your own. Higher education should
make you more cosmopolitan than you were before you started.
Little way to greatly improve your ability to communicate (write,
speak, do oral presentations) more intelligently—which is a major
goal of formal learning. 
THANK YOU