Adult Education for Health and Wellness: New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education Paperback - 2011 - 1st Edition

One task of adulthood is caring for one's health, and, for many, caring for the health of children, a spouse or significant other, or aging parents. Health changes over time in response to wellness activities, aging, or disease. Adult learning is central to people's abilities to cope with changing physical abilities, medical conditions, and the changes in lifestyle and social conditions resulting from them. Chapters in this volume address:

- How adults learn while coping with chronic illness

- Curriculum design for a program for parents with special needs children

- Health education within adult literacy, adult basic education, and English as a Second Language classes

- Ways to address the needs of adults who have low levels of health literacy

- Means of increasing cultural competence among health workers to meet the needs of diverse patients

- Community education performed by trained indigenous community health advisors

- Approaches to help adults evaluate and learn from online information

- The influence of globalism on health

- Ways that health education can be a social justice issue

This diversity of arenas prompts new roles for adult educators. They provide health education alone or in collaboration with health professionals, and they educate health professionals about adults' learning needs, especially individuals who have low levels of health literacy and are from diverse cultural backgrounds. They create meaningful curricula, assist individuals to interpret health information, and influence the design of online information. Other important contributions include training local individuals to serve as community health advisors, helping adults cope with health challenges rooted in increasing globalism, and working for social justice. Finally, adult educators can work with communities to create health-related public policy that contributes to improved quality of life.