Why would a learner not want to learn? There can be lots of reasons and not all of them relate to what you're doing as an educator!

Fear of the Unknown. As learners we enjoy the security and comfort of doing things which are known. However, the whole idea of learning is to move to the unknown. This can create lots of anxiety on the part of the learner. It can be very uncomfortable moving away from our comfort zone in the name of learning.

Appearing Foolish in Public. We've all been in the situation where we want to sink down in our seat so that the educator will call on someone else and not embarrass us in front of the group. The fear that accompanies such a feeling can completely wipe out any potential opportunity that might have existed for meaningful learning.

Associating Learning with Schooling. Try as we may to create a learning environment that is just right for our topic, sometimes a learner brings a lot of "baggage" to the situation. In other words, the learner may find him/herself reliving some not-so-positive school experiences from many years before.

Fear of Being Co-Opted. Sometimes it is important for a learner to maintain a certain image or presence in the eyes of his/her neighbors and friends. The skillful extension educator will recognize this and build on the situation. However, if the learner senses that his/her image is being co-opted by the educator and used to promote the educator's ideas, there can be extreme resistance.

Poor Match between Teaching Style and Learning Style. Though all of the books suggest that we as educators must be sensitive to the learner and adjust our teaching to best suit the learner, it just isn't that easy to do it. More often than not we, as the educator, teach the way we prefer. And, if the learner doesn't like to learn that way it can create a lot of resistance toward learning.

Irrelevance of the Instruction. If you're working with a group of learners over a long period of time you greatly improve your chance of making the focus of your teaching very relevant to the needs and interests of the learners. Most extension educators, however, are often faced with the opposite situation. They don't know very much about the learners and they are only going to work with them on a single occasion. This greatly increases the risk of having the instruction be irrelevant to the learners.

Lack of Clarity in Instructions. Try as we may, sometimes it's almost impossible to communicate a set of complex instructions to a group of learners. Eventually we may end up by saying, "Just go ahead and begin. It will get clearer as you proceed with the task." I don't think so! If it is the educator who is in the driver's seat, then it is the educator that's responsible for presenting instructions in a clear, well sequenced and meaningful way.