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The air is thick with Pennsylvanian humidity. The sun’s rays scorch my skin as sweat beads at my temples. Going to the zoo on a sizzling July afternoon probably wasn’t the best idea.
As my family and I staggered through the park, trying to stay under the trees’ welcoming shade, we stumbled across a musical hideaway. Giant drums and xylophones adorned a little corner of the Elmwood Park Zoo. Seeing the larger-than-life instruments, my three children rushed to the play area, grabbing and beating away. Cacophony ensued.
As my husband and I rested on a nearby bench, watching them jump from music station to music station, he sighed, “I think this is their favorite part.”
Observing the giraffes, countless birds, elk, and other animals brought my children joy, but this experience was the icing on the cake. They had complete autonomy in this musical hideaway. They explored the giant instruments with unbridled enthusiasm while navigating the social nuances of sharing with kids they had never met.
My youngest tended to gravitate toward where his sister played while my oldest brazenly stampeded around the hideaway, soaking in each opportunity to engage and create. This experience reminded me of how we as educators can truly engage students in not only their academics but also their social-emotional development.
In this week’s post, I’ll review what experiential learning is as its roots go as far back as the great educational titan, John Dewey. Then, I’ll provide a 5-step guide on how a teacher can begin planning and incorporating experiential learning into their practice to enhance student engagement.
What is Experiential Learning?
Learning is socially constructed (Bandura, 1977; Dewey, 1938; Vygotsky, 1977). Through social experiences, we broaden and deepen our understanding of the world around us. How often do we remember an experiment or project versus the book we read or the lecture we heard detailing a theory?
Real-world experiences can be meaningful opportunities for us to explore our learning. Dewey (1938) and the progressivists proclaim the power of a pedagogy that does not just fill empty minds with knowledge but provides students with opportunities to create and solidify knowledge through observation and engagement.
We learn by doing. We construct knowledge through experience because learning is dynamic. Experiential learning can empower students to develop skills they can then translate into their worldly experiences (Dewey, 1938).
Fast-forward almost fifty years later, and we have David Kolb (1984) solidifying his experiential learning theory into a four-stage model - concrete learning, reflective observation, abstract conceptualization, and active experimentation. The first two stages call on the learner to understand the experience while the last two are about transforming that experience.
According to Kolb:
Concrete learning involves a learner experiencing new learning or interpreting past learning differently.
Reflective observation happens when a learner reflects and connects personally with an experience. They may ask themselves what the experience means.
Abstract conceptualization requires the learner to transform the experience into new thinking or learning based on their reflection on the experience.
Active experimentation occurs when the learner transfers their knowledge or tests their learning in the real world.
This cycle is iterative as a learner engages with their world and learning.
What are the Benefits of Experiential Learning?
If I haven’t sold you on the idea of experiential learning, then let me detail some of the benefits that were even found in a recent study.
Student engagement: Students apply their knowledge and connect their learning to real-life experiences. It doesn’t matter how engaging you think you are as a lecturer, nothing says learning like doing and experiencing. When we apply our learning to an experience and reflect, we retain that information better. We are rooting our knowledge into our brains through experience.
Encourage social-emotional competencies: If you don’t know what I mean by SEL competencies, then check out the CASEL framework. Since experiential learning is active, we usually work socially with others and collaborate. Because of this, students practice self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, responsible decision-making, and relationship skills. These skills transfer far beyond the walls of a school and can empower students in the real world.
Increase motivation: Experiences can be memorable and interesting, so it is no surprise that student motivation will be high. Experiments and experiences bring joy and excitement to learning and provide students with opportunities to explore their passions.
Beyond these three benefits, experiential learning creates lasting memories for our students. When they reflect back on their time in school, they will remember the fun and delight of the experiences they had. Little did they know, they were learning along the way, too.
5 Steps to Engage Students Through Experiential Learning
Experiential learning sounds pretty awesome, right? A teacher’s and student’s dream? Now, let’s make that dream a reality. Here is a 5 step guide for you to follow so that your students can maximize their learning while having fun at the same time:
1. Start with the end in mind
We always have to think about our end goal. What do we hope students accomplish? What learning objective do we want them to explore? These questions will help you narrow your focus. Once you have the end in mind, you can then begin planning the learning.
2. Plan the experiences
Provide suitable experiences for students to explore. The more open-ended the better because that will provide students voice and choice. There is a litany of potential experiential learning ideas such as:
Field trips (the zoo!)
Science experiments
Role-playing
Artistic endeavors
Service projects
Action research
Mock trials
Content-based projects
Dioramas
And the list goes on… For my kids, we visited the zoo and read about the animals. We then observed their interactions in a (somewhat) natural habitat. When we explored the musical hideaway, they had the opportunity to test out sounds and instruments while navigating social nuances with other kiddos.
Whatever the experience, ensure alignment with your end goal and integrate the next three steps.
3. Be the guide on the side
As the teacher, you will be the guide on the side, posing problems, setting boundaries, supporting learners, and providing resources. Now, if during the exploration or learning phase, there is a spontaneous learning opportunity, carpet diem! You do not necessarily have to stick to the script as long as the experience will get the students to that end goal.
You want to help your students notice any connections between one context and another, encouraging students to examine and reexamine. The teacher being the facilitator also provides students opportunities for autonomy and ownership which both lead to empowerment and engagement.
4. Incorporate reflection
Before, during, and after the experience there needs to be plenty of opportunities for reflection. Active reflection can deepen understanding and ingrain learning in our minds. Students who engage in reflection can even improve their memory while keeping their minds active.
When we actively engage in reflection, we practice our critical thinking skills. The teacher must be present to support reflection as needed, especially with our younger students who may need prompting or sentence stems to guide their reflection.
5. Encourage application
Finally, if you really want to solidify learning, encourage the application of the experience. Whatever knowledge they gleaned, see if they can take that learning and apply it to another area or experience. Something in the real world that will drive their curiosity and their passion for learning and growing, which is what we all hope for our students.
One Last Thought
Going to the zoo provided my kids the opportunity to observe and learn from an experience. And we didn't just experience the deliciously cooling vanilla soft serve ice cream. When my kids migrated to the musical hideaway, they learned by doing.
If we truly want to engage our students in learning, we need to free ourselves from the traditional approaches, the neatly conceptualized frameworks, and provide something more. If we truly want our students to transfer their learning to something more than a worksheet. We need to start thinking and innovating outside the box.
Take learning to new heights that cause our students’ young minds to question, reflect, critique, and grow. And the learning should not just be strictly academic. We must provide opportunities that enable them to practice the human skills that have been lacking these past few years due to COVID and the blackhole of social media and tech.
Look around you and seize opportunities within your local community. Be that guide on the side who invigorates kids’ internal passions and flames for learning and exploration.
References
Abdulwahed, M., & Nagy, Z. K. (2009). Applying Kolb's experiential learning cycle for laboratory education. Journal of Engineering Education, 98(3), 283-294.
Bandura, A., & Walters, R. H. (1977). Social learning theory (Vol. 1, pp. 141-154). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice hall.Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York: Macmillan.
Edmentum Inc. (2024, June 7). The importance of Self-Reflection in learning. Edmentum. https://www.edmentum.com/articles/self-reflection-in-learning/#:~:text=After%20learning%20tasks%2C%20if%20students,for%20looking%20back%20on%20learning.
Experiential Learning | Center for Teaching & Learning. (n.d.). © 2024 Boston University. https://www.bu.edu/ctl/ctl_resource/experiential-learning/
Experiential learning theory. (2022, October 24). Western Governors University. https://www.wgu.edu/blog/experiential-learning-theory2006.html#:~:text=Kolb%20published%20this%20model%20in,abstract%20conceptualization%2C%20and%20active%20experimentation.
Kolb, D. A. (2014). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. FT press.
Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
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