Experiential learning meaning

Experiential learning is a holistic philosophy of education based on the notion that an individual’s life experiences, education, and work play a central role in their learning and understanding of new knowledge (Kolb and Kolb, 2009).

It refers to learning through experience or learning by doing. Learners are immersed in an experience and then encouraged to reflect on the experience to develop new skills, new attitudes, or new ways of thinking (Lewis and Williams,1994).

This implies that experiential learning is a learning process where students are engaged in hands-on experience and reflection. This helps them to interact with the world and generate a deep understanding of what they are learning.

It is thus a discovery process where learners sort out issues, create knowledge and develop skills out of experiences.

The first advocate of this concept was John Dewey (1938). He emphasizes that there must be a relationship between experience and education.

According to him, a learning experience does not just happen; it is a planned event with meaning, and with experiential learning, the meaning is reaffirmed by the learners.

So, experiential learning is aligned with the constructivist theory of learning in that learners are actively constructing meaning and engaged in assessing themselves. The learning outcomes differ as what one learner takes away from an experience will be different from the others.

According to Kolb (1984), experiential learning can be described as a four-stage process:

1. Concrete Experience: Doing. Through participation in learning activities, students get hands-on experience on problem-solving tasks.
2. Reflection: Observing. Students recall their memory or look at records of the learning activities. In groups or individually they review and reflect on the process and observe others’ behaviours during the activities as well.
3. Abstract conceptualisation: Thinking. Students generalise knowledge and theory from previous experience based on reflection.
4. Active Experiment: Planning. Students then modify existing concepts and knowledge with the new theory they come up with and apply in later occasions.

 

However, involving students in a prescribed set of learning experiences does not necessarily make experiential learning. There must be certain characteristics or principles to define an activity or method as experiential.

Key principles of experiential learning

Here are 5 essential principles of experiential learning.

1. Mixture of content and process

Experiential learning empowers students to apply their theoretical knowledge in practice both inside and outside the classroom to understand the phenomena being studied.

Students gain knowledge by observing, reflecting, critically analyzing, investigating, and solving problems.

Therefore, to help students create knowledge through the transformation of experience there must be a balance between the experiential activities and the underlying content or theory (Chapman et al.,1995).

2. Engaging experience

This requires linking actions and thoughts. To help students learn from experience, they must reflect on it as Dewey (1933) maintained: “We do not learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience” (p.78).

To this end, the role of educators is to encourage students to reflect on what happened, how it happened, and why. Also, providing opportunities for students to make decisions, assess their learning, cooperate, share their voices and be creative can boost their engagement.

Yet, students can’t engage in experiential learning unless they see the value of doing so.

Experiential learning addresses the needs and wants of individuals and is related to their personal change and growth.

It is therefore important to select learning activities that are personally relevant to the students.

3. Connection to the real world

In experiential learning, students work on real-life issues. They make connections between the learning they are doing and the world. They relate their knowledge to their daily lives, explore and examine their own values.

So, learning is authentic because it helps students explore and understand better their local context.

This makes them more active citizens who can make a difference in their society.

4. Learning is personal

All learning experiences are personal and unique to us as Boud et al (1993) explained, “Each experience is influenced by the unique past of the learner “(p.10).

So, it is important to encourage students to take risks, learn out of their comfort zones and get accountable for their actions and own the consequences.

Trusting them to learn by themselves while offering them resources to learn is essential.

Loynes (2000) suggests that experiential learning should be a source of emerging ideas, rather than a place to prove other people’s fixed ideas. Instead of imposing pre-packaged theories or ideas to generate pre-prepared solutions, educators should allow students to build their theories from their actions.

So, unlike the traditional classroom where the focus is on instruction, experiential learning emphasizes facilitating students’ learning.

But, what makes a good facilitator in experiential learning?

Wickes (2000) offers the key ingredients of facilitator excellence as follows:

• Creating the right climate;
• getting in – rapport;
• creating experiences that work;
• creating engaging, memorable, and meaningful experiences;
• helping people review, articulate, and share personal learning;
• making it easy to disclose and share experiences;
• maintaining a constructive atmosphere;
• creating a powerful, emotional, and satisfying experience.

 

5. Mistakes are embraced

Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes. (Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere’s Fan)

Experiential learning has its challenges. Students are likely to experience hard knocks and psychological blows which prevent them from reaching their goals.

As Snell (1992) emphasized, for people to learn from hard knocks they had to see them as a learning opportunity.

Introducing experiential learning would not suffice even with the right choice of activities and learning materials. Students may withdraw from any challenge causing them fear and anxiety.

So, to help them overcome such negative feelings, we should emphasize that mistakes are the result of experimenting with the unfamiliar.

We must face the challenge, and learn from our mistakes instead of withdrawing and remaining within our comfort zones.

To instill such a learning culture among our students, we have to create a safe space so that they can work through their own process of self-discovery, and learn through trial and error.

Providing guidance, scaffolding, and constructive feedback throughout the process of experimenting are also powerful incentives for students to make further efforts to pursue their goals.

Experiential learning activities

Experiential learning can be used with students of all ages, regardless of the subject they’re learning. Here are some examples of experiential learning activities.

#Field trips

Students visit other environments, access tools, and engage with content in a variety of ways.  This can help them see the connections between what they are learning at school and what is happening in the real world.

#Project-based learning

Students work in groups to search for real problems and concepts. Then, they develop their final products to demonstrate learning and share them with a public and relevant audience. To learn more about PBL, read: 3 Key Characteristics of Project-Based Learning

#Science experiments

These don’t necessarily require lab equipment. There are fun and easy science experiments students can do at home or school and learn from. Here are some examples.

#Drama and role-playing

Students imagine that they are either themselves or another person in a particular situation. They reflect and develop a greater understanding of self and others. So, the focus here is on the growth and development of the student rather than the entertainment or stimulation of the observer.

#Storytelling

Asking students to write stories can develop their memory and visualization skills. Telling those stories can trigger memorable pictures in the minds of their listeners. By doing so, the information would be best understood and remembered.

#Reflection on reality – writing

Different writing techniques can be used to enhance students’ reflection such as:

• guided imagery – free writing stimulated by an image such as ‘being on a journey’,
• life stages – writing about events in life as if they were chapters of a book,
• stepping stones – reviewing formative life experiences from the vantage point of the present;
• the daily log – to record the day’s events;
• the period log – to record a current period in the writer’s life;
• dialogue – creating a dialogue with a person, event, or object from the writer’s life;
• altered point of view – writing about oneself in the third person, or about someone else in the first person (McLeod, 1997).

Experiencing rich learning opportunities is the essence of experiential learning. It makes students more engaged, improves their concentration and retention and so accelerates learning.

By encouraging their reflection and decision-making, they can even develop the necessary lifelong learning skills. So, experiential learning is worth using in teaching.

References

Boud, David, and Walker, David. (1993). Barriers to reflection on experience, in Using Experience for Learning, eds D Boud, R., Cohen and D. Walker, pp 73–86.

Dewey, J.(1933).How We Think. A restatement of the relation of reflective thinking to the educative process, D C Heath, Boston.

Dewey, John. (1938). Experience and Education, The Kappa Delta Pi Lecture Series, Macmillan, New York.

Kolb, David. A.(1984). Experiential Learning: Experience as the source of learning and development, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

Kolb A Y and Kolb, D.A. (2009).The learning way: meta-cognitive aspects of experiential learning, Simulation and Gaming, 40 (3), pp 297–327.

Lewis, L.H. & Williams, C.J. (1994). In Jackson, L. & Caffarella, R.S. (Eds.). Experiential Learning: A New Approach (pp. 5-16). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

McLeod, J. (1997).Narrative and Psychotherapy, Sage, London.

Snell, Robin.(1992).Experiential learning at work: why can’t it be painless? Personnel Review, 21 (4), pp 12–26.

Wickes, S (2000).The facilitators’ stories, Organisation Development , Brathay Topical Papers, 2 , pp 25–46, Brathay, Cumbria.