Abstract:
Based on empirical research supported by a Queensland Government Department of Education and Training 'Horizon Grant' titled "Informal Learning in the Secondary School: Behaviour Remediation Programs and the Informal Learning Environment as a Space for Re-engagement", this paper will explore the implications of informal learning and informal learning spaces in the secondary school. Prefaced on peer-mediated and dialogic pedagogies and the use of non-traditional spaces for engagement within the school setting, the project explored the possibilities that exist for re-engaging students who had disengaged from the formal classroom. Using an earlier pilot research project- the "Bike Build Program"- as its foundation, "Informal Learning in the Secondary School" sought to theorise how students come to learning and the effects that unexpected sites of learning play in shaping experiences of school. Taking theoretical cues from the spatial theory of Henri Lefebvre and infused with critical pedagogical concerns for social justice and dialogic pedagogy derived from Ira Shor and Henry Giroux, "Informal Learning in the Secondary School" demonstrated that teaching and learning can take on new dynamism when decoupled from the mediating effects of the formal classroom. When confronted with the 'unexpected' space that the informal learning environment provides, assumptions around what counts as schooling and how learning should be conducted are reconfigured. Drawing on accounts derived from field based participant observation and interviews with students and teachers as its point of reference, this presentation will outline how informality might be considered within formal locations of schooling, and in particular, will chart the reconceptualisation of the delivery of formal curricula material in non-traditional learning environments. How aspects of the Australian Curriculum might feasibly be (re)incorporated into the informal learning environment with a view to re-engaging disengaged learners, whilst also enhancing the nature of peer-mediated learning and collaboration will provide a focus for this paper.