“I HEAR AND I FORGET
I SEE AND I REMEMBER
I DO AND I UNDERSTAND” 

(Gentry, 1990)

Experiential learning is based on building knowledge, understanding and meaning from real-life experience (Yardley et al., 2012). According to Gentry (1990), a person must actually test their knowledge in a real life situation to know it with certainty, and until then, a person can only think that they know the information. Experiential learning is often hands on, such as an internship or a hands-on lab. An example of experiential learning that could be applied to grade K-2 children, would be going to the zoo and learning through observing animals rather than reading about them.

Experiential learning was developed by Kolb in 1984 and falls under the constructivists theoretical perspective. This approach promotes the involvement and responsibility of the student, as they are directly involved in the learning process. It allows for flexibility and the incorporation of full-cycle learning, while encouraging students to apply what they have learned in school to everyday-life problem solving (Kong, 2021).

After discussing other learning methods with my group, we do not think that this approach best aligns with our topic on teaching young children about race. Although we will be incorporating activities and hands-on crafts and projects in our lesson plan, I think that direction from the teacher will also be necessary for teaching our topic. The students will benefit from an approach that allows for instruction and then application, rather than learning strictly from the application. With a topic as important as race, which oftentimes is taboo, students will need a teacher to explain this concept and answer questions. Students will then apply this knowledge in activities that will show them what a real-life example could look like. Because our target audience is so young, they may not have yet had a real life experience with race, or if they have, they may be too young to understand what was happening. Doing these exercises will further their understanding but I think that an explanation and examples from an instructor first, is necessary. 

References

Gentry, J. W. (1990). What is experiential learning. Guide to business gaming and experiential learning, 9, 20. Retrieved from https://wmich.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/u5/2013/WHAT%20IS%20EXPERIENTIAL%20%20LEARNING%3F%20%20.pdf

Kong, Y. (2021). The role of experiential learning on students’ motivation and classroom engagement. Frontiers in Psychology, 12. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.771272 

​​Yardley, S., Teunissen, P. W., & Dornan, T. (2012). Experiential learning: Transforming theory into practice. Medical Teacher, 34(2), 161–164. https://doi.org/10.3109/0142159X.2012.643264