Experiential Learning Cycle: A Catalyst to Jump Start

Student ReflectionLilly Conference, Bethesda

May 2014

Dr. Annie Jonas Dr. Megan Keiser

Goals for Workshop

learn stages of Experiential Learning Cycle learn how experiential learning can bridge

theory and practice learn how to deepen and strengthen the

quality of reflection during service-learning reflect on your own practice and use the

planning guide

Evolution of Learning Cycle

“Tell me, and I will forget. Show me, and I may remember.

Involve me, and I will understand.”

-Confucius, 450 BC

John Dewey

"...there is an intimate and necessary relation between the processes of actual experience and education”.

-Dewey, 1938, p.20

David Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle

Extinction of Learning Cycle?

One challenge now is to develop conceptions of experiential learning that do not “limit our theorizing and threaten to repress both experiencing and learning processes”.

-Fenwick, 2001, p. 25

Experiential Learning Cycle & Brain-based Learning

*Brain-compatible approach (Caine & Caine, 1994)

*Brain’s inherent form and function align with experiential learning (Roberts, 2002)

Brain ISO Minds-On Moments -Time to reflect -Time to connect -Time to emote and choose (Roberts, 2002)

Brain In Search Of Experiential Learning

Turn and Talk

What aspect of Kolb's Learning Cycle is comfortable for you as a teacher?

What aspect of the cycle still gives you pause or do you still wonder about?

Service-Learning

Service-learning is a teaching and learning strategy that integrates meaningful community service with instruction and reflection to: Enrich the learning experience Teach civic responsibility Strengthen communities

Learn & Serve America

Volunteering vs Service-Learning

Reflection: the missing link

“Reflection is the hyphen in service-learning; it is the process that helps students connect what they observe and experience in the community with their academic study.”

-Eyler, 2001

Experience + Reflection = Learning

Power of Reflection

Activates metacognition Supports complexity and dissonance Provides scaffolding Nurtures growth

Planning for Effective Reflection w/Reflection Map

Before Service

During Service

After Service

Reflect Alone

Identify

assumptions

Journal Entry

Letter to Self

Reflect w/ Peer

Turn & Talk Plus/Delta Oral Exam

Object

Reflect w/ CP

Identify needs & strengths

Midpoint check

Round Table

-adapted Eyler, 2001

Reflection Strategies

Move, Reflect, & Share

Select an object or a card from the collection that illustrates how you feel about implementing more reflective practices in your courses.

Share the object and why you selected it.

Reflection vs. Critical Reflection

Clayton Model

Generates learning (articulating questions, confronting bias, examining causality, contrasting theory with practice, pointing to systemic issues)

Deepens learning (challenging simplistic conclusions, inviting alternative perspectives, asking “why” iteratively)

Documents learning (producing tangible expressions of new understandings for evaluation)

DEAL model for Critical ReflectionDescribe

DEAL model for Critical ReflectionExamine

DEAL model for Critical ReflectionArticulate Learning

Explicit Prompt for Summative Critical Reflection Paper

Expectations:*describe your current and evolving understanding of the role of the teacher and the role of the student in a learning experience. *describe what you conceive are the most important responsibilities for a student and for a teacher. *incorporate perspectives from:

- class readings - initial experiences teaching at our service-

learning site -your experience as a high school student and new

role as a student at college.

Audience: This class, community partners, and Service Program Office.

Example of a student reflection

Excerpt from a FY student’s critical reflection on the role and responsibility of a teacher after 6 weeks working in a high school

Teachers must act as guides for students, helping to shape the environment around them and the learning process within them. Since students certainly don’t enter school as plastic and featureless clay, teachers cannot be godlike formers of human nature. To try would be absurd. Ms. Rookey is not foolish enough to try that. My impression of her has been one of a shepherd, herding a bunch of high school students and making sure they have what they need to do pursue their own path. Students, John Dewey preached, have an almost infinite amount of possibilities within them if given the chance to guide their own learning. In our writing project at the high school, I allowed my students to create questions to guide the entire writing process and in this way, the students directly and indirectly determined what they wanted to learn.

Reflect

Think of a prompt that you could use in a course that explicitly utilizes a component of the DEAL model for reflection.

Experiential Bridges Theory and Practice

There is a need of forming a theory of experience in order that education may be intelligently conducted upon the basis of experience.

-John Dewey

Lingering Questions?

I fully realize that I have not answered all of your questions.

Indeed, I feel that I have not answered any of your questions completely. The answers we have found only serve to raise a whole new set of questions,

which only lead to more problems…some of which we weren’t even aware of as problems.

To summarize, in some ways I feel that we are as confused as ever, but I believe we are confused on a higher level and about more important things.

-Poster above physics teacher’s door

Next steps

As you plan ahead, remember that the time invested in reflection impacts the harvest.

For links to documents related to this presentation, go to:

Keiser-Jonas Consulting:

http://keiserjonasconsulting.wordpress.org

References

Ash, S. L., & Clayton, P. H. (2009a). Learning through critical reflection: A tutorial for students in service-learning, Raleigh, NC

Caine, G., & Caine, R. (1994). Making connections: teaching and the human brain. New York: Addison Wesley.

Dewey, J. (1938) Experience and education. New York: Collier Books

Eyler, J. (2002). Reflection: Linking service and learning, linking students and communities. Journal of Social Issues, 58(3), 517-534.

Fenwick, T. (2001). Experiential learning: A theoretical critique from five perspectives. Ohio State University: ERIC Clearinghouse on Adult, Career, and Vocational Education.

Kolb, D. (1984) Experiential learning. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall

Roberts, J. (2011). Beyond learning by doing: Theoretical currents in experiential education. New York: Routledge