Adult education methods effective for training community health workers, including participatory adult education methodologies, liberation education and popular education

Community health workers (CHWs) play an essential role in helping people understand chronic disease, access health care services, embrace positive health behaviors, and navigate complicated treatment regimens for conditions such as cancer, diabetes, asthma and HIV/AIDS. As community members, CHWs are able to integrate health information about disease treatment and prevention into the community's culture, language, and value systems. They seldom dictate, lecture or issue commands or directives. Much of the work of CHWs is firmly rooted in the philosophies of Paolo Freire and popular education methodologies. Popular education is an educational technique designed to raise the consciousness of its participants and allow them to become more aware of how an individual's personal experiences are connected to larger societal problems. Participants are empowered to act to effect change on the problems that affect them. Popular educators facilitate groups, assisting them to identify their strengths and abilities to change their social conditions. This session will examine popular education techniques and participatory adult training methods for CHWs and examine the policy and planning implications of these methods. The presenters include a CHW with experience training CHWs using participatory adult learning methodologies.