Brief Introduction

Adult education is the education given to an adult person, man or woman. Many people think of education as what goes on in a school classroom, a series of lessons on set “subject’ from time to time by examinations and ending in a “qualified” or ticket to ascertain type and level of job, after that the process is over from this point of view, anyone who has never been to school is uneducated and without knowledge.

Such a view was the characteristic of the colonial period when foreign rulers were anxious to encourage people to absorb a given type of people of knowledge sufficient to make them god clerks or storekeepers and not to go beyond that knowledge to independent thought and questioning.

Some learning is informal that is gained incidentally and casually from conservation in the market or a commercial on the radio or the front page of a newspaper. When learning is consciously promoted, it then becomes part of the process of education. If education is lifelong, it follows that it can be pursued at any given age.

Though it is recognized that some types of learning, particularly skills that may depend on youthfulness formal attainment of adulthood is often marked by special ceremonies and rituals varying from traditional initiation to twenty-first birthday party.