Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development

by David Kolb

Overview

Experiential learning is a powerful and proven approach to teaching and learning that is based on one incontrovertible reality: people learn best through experience. Now, in this extensively updated book, David A. Kolb offers a systematic and up-to-date statement of the theory of experiential learning and its modern applications to education, work, and adult development.

 

Experiential Learning, Second Edition builds on the intellectual origins of experiential learning as defined by figures such as John Dewey, Kurt Lewin, Jean Piaget, and L.S. Vygotsky, while also reflecting three full decades of research and practice since the classic first edition.

 

Kolb models the underlying structures of the learning process based on the latest insights in psychology, philosophy, and physiology. Building on his comprehensive structural model, he offers an exceptionally useful typology of individual learning styles and corresponding structures of knowledge in different academic disciplines and careers. Kolb also applies experiential learning to higher education and lifelong learning, especially with regard to adult education.

 

This edition reviews recent applications and uses of experiential learning, updates Kolb's framework to address the current organizational and educational landscape, and features current examples of experiential learning both in the field and in the classroom. It will be an indispensable resource for everyone who wants to promote more effective learning: in higher education, training, organizational development, lifelong learning environments, and online.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780133892505
Publisher:	Pearson Education
Publication date:	12/17/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	416
File size:	8 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Craig Stanford is a professor of anthropology and biological sciences at the University of Southern California, where he also co-directs the Jane Goodall Research Center. He has conducted field research on primate behavior in south Asia, Latin America, and East Africa. He is well known for his long-term studies of meat-eating among wild chimpanzees in Gombe, Tanzania, and of the relationship between mountain gorillas and chimpanzees in the Impenetrable Forest of Uganda. He has authored or coauthored more than 130 scientific publications. Craig has received USC’s highest teaching awards for his introductory biological anthropology course.

John Allen is a research scientist in the Dornsife Cognitive Neuroscience Imaging Center and the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California. He is also Research Associate in the Department of Anthropology, Indiana University. Previously, he was a neuroscience researcher at the University of Iowa College of Medicine and a faculty member in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, for several years.  His primary research interests are the evolution of the human brain and behaviour, and behavioral disease. He also has research experience in molecular genetics, nutritional anthropology, and the history of anthropology. He has conducted fieldwork in Japan, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, and Palau. He has received university awards for teaching introductory courses in biological anthropology both as a graduate student instructor at the University of California and as a faculty member at the University of Auckland.

Susan Antón is a professor in the Center for the Study of Human Origins, Department of Anthropology at New York University, where she also directs the M.A. program in Human Skeletal Biology. Her field research concerns the evolution of genus Homo in Indonesia and human impact on island ecosystems in the South Pacific. She is best known for her research on H. erectus in Kenya and Indonesia, for which she was elected as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). She is the President of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists and past editor of the Journal of Human Evolution. She received awards for teaching as a graduate student instructor of introductory physical anthropology and anatomy at the University of California, was Teacher of the Year while at the University of Florida, and received a Golden Dozen teaching award and the Distinguished Teaching Medal from NYU.

Table of Contents

Foreword    x

About the Author    xii

Preface    xiii

Introduction    xvi

Part I  Experience and Learning

Chapter 1  The Foundations of Contemporary Approaches to Experiential Learning    1

Experiential Learning in Higher Education: The Legacy of John Dewey    4

Experiential Learning in Training and Organization Development: The Contributions of Kurt Lewin    8

Jean Piaget and the Cognitive-Development Tradition of Experiential Learning    12

Other Contributions to Experiential Learning Theory    15

Update and Reflections    19

Foundational Scholars of Experiential Learning Theory    19

Liminal Scholars    20

Contributions to Experiential Learning    23

Chapter 2  The Process of Experiential Learning    31

Three Models of the Experiential Learning Process    32

Characteristics of Experiential Learning 37

Summary: A Definition of Learning    49

Update and Reflections    50

The Learning Cycle and the Learning Spiral    50

Understanding the Learning Cycle    50

The Learning Spiral    61

Part II  The Structure of Learning and Knowledge

Chapter 3  Structural Foundations of the Learning Process    65

Process and Structure in Experiential Learning    66

The Prehension Dimension-Apprehension Versus Comprehension    69

The Transformation Dimension-Intention and Extension    77

Summary    85

Update and Reflections    87

Experiential Learning and the Brain    87

James Zull and the Link between the Learning Cycle and Brain Functioning    88

My Brain Made Me Do It?    94

Chapter 4  Individuality in Learning and the Concept of Learning Styles    97

The Scientific Study of Individuality    98

Learning Styles as Possibility-Processing Structures    100

Assessing Individual Learning Styles: The Learning Style Inventory    104

Evidence for the Structure of Learning    111

Characteristics of the Basic Learning Styles    114

Summary and Conclusion    135

Update and Reflections    137

Individuality, the Self, and Learning Style    137

Western and Eastern Views of the Self    138

Experiential Learning and the Self    139

Learning Style    141

Chapter 5  The Structure of Knowledge    153

Apprehension vs    Comprehension—A Dual-Knowledge Theory    154

The Dialectics of Apprehension and Comprehension    159

The Structure of Social Knowledge: World Hypotheses    164

Summary    173

Social Knowledge as Living Systems of Inquiry—The Relation between the Structure of Knowledge and Fields of Inquiry and Endeavor    175

Update and Reflections    186

The Spiral of Knowledge Creation    186

Personal Characteristics and Ways of Knowing    188

Knowledge Structures and Disciplinary Learning Spaces 190

The knowledge Structures of Experiential Learning    192

Part III  Learning and Development

Chapter 6  The Experiential Learning Theory of Development    197

Learning and Development as Transactions between Person and Environment    198

Differentiation and Integration in Development    199

Unilinear vs    Multilinear Development    201

The Experiential Learning Theory of Development    205

Consciousness, Learning, and Development    210

Adaptation, Consciousness, and Development    216

Update and Reflections    225

Culture and Context    226

Individual Differences and Multilinear Development    227

Integration and Advanced Stages of Adult Development    228

Implications for Experiential Learning Theory Development Theory    234

Chapter 7  Learning and Development in Higher Education    239

Specialized Development and the Process of Accentuation    242

Undergraduate Student Development in a Technological University    244

Professional Education and Career Adaptation    261

A Comparative Study of Professional Education in Social Work and Engineering    263

Managing the Learning Process    276

Implications for Higher Education    283

Update and Reflections    287

Becoming an Experiential Educator    287

Chapter 8  Lifelong Learning and Integrative Development    311

Adaptive Flexibility and Integrative Development    315

On Integrity and Integrative Knowledge    327

Update and Reflections    333

Lifelong Learning and the Learning Way    333

Bibliography    355

Index    377