What Does the Research Say?


DIY learning in Formal, Non Formal and Informal Settings

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DIY in Non-formal and Informal Education

DIY definitely falls within the category of informal learning. This definition from the National Science foundation is nearly identical to what many of us would perceive as DIY learning:

“[I]nformal education consists of learning activities that are voluntary and self-directed, life-long, and motivated mainly by intrinsic interests, curiosity, exploration, manipulation, fantasy, task completion, and social interaction.” (National Science Foundation, 1997)


Similarly, non-formal learning is intentional from the learner's point of view. It is embedded in planned activities that are not explicitly designated as learning (in terms of objectives, learning time or learning support), but which contain an important learning element. It typically does not lead to certification (Cedefop, 2014). For example, this might mean any open environment (e.g. a social media platform or video sharing platform).

The internet has had a great role in the "legitimizing" of informal/non-formal learning as a structured and in-depth process. Before the internet, DIY learning was often in the form of "...for Dummies" books that failed to teach beyond superficial details of most given topics (Schroeder, 2019).


The efficacy and newfound proficiency of informal education has created a "do-it-yourself mindset" that is changing the perception of education as a whole. Self-teaching options like short courses and bootcamp seminars have become popular and prevalent, matching the sentiment of a survey in the United States that found that 84 percent of people believe that learning will become "even more self-service" as they get older (Schaffhauser, 2019).

"Logic for Dummies", Amazon.ca

Learners in a DIY context

Now we know that non-formal/informal DIY learning is taken on by the individual themselves. So how do we, as learners, DIY? We will look closer at this question in the next section: Exploration of DIY.

DIY in Formal Education

As we all know, formal learning is structured and organized, has learning objectives and takes place within learning institutions (OECD).

Generally, DIY learning is informal in nature, as it encompasses all self-directed learning activities. However, DIY learning has a place in formal settings as well. So where does DIY learning fit into formal education? Learning theory provides that self-acquired knowledge can be crucial in many learning contexts. In this way, educators, instead of providing content, provide resources to facilitate self-determined learning and peer-to-peer learning. So instead of providing content, educators provide the environment in which students can produce their own knowledge (INFED).


Formal Educators in a DIY World

The availability of informal and non-formal learning through the internet has forced formal education to drastically change the role of the teacher in the classroom. Because students have been given the ability to learn with online sources, teaching methods in schools have had to shift towards this new reality in which teachers are no longer the “keepers” of knowledge, but instead must become facilitators. Because knowledge has become so much more dynamic, open-ended and flexible questioning must be employed because teaching to the test no longer prepares students for the future (Gibbons, 2018).


This shift of educational mindset can be labeled the shift from pedagogy to "heutagogy," being the study of self-determined learning. For specific learning models that employ heutagogy and DIY learning skills, click here to continue to the K-12 page.


Tips:

  • Provide resources – provide an array of resources that students can take or leave (be it academic/online resources or a variety of items for practical exploration.)

  • Allow participants students to self-direct learning (i.e. chose topics to research)

  • Students plan and assess their own learning journey – instead of determining the outcome of an activity, allows students to determine their own learning goals

Examples