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Standards of Practice: Eight
Principles of Good Practice for All Experiential Learning Activities
Regardless of
the experiential learning activity, both the experience and the learning are
fundamental. In the learning process and in the relationship between the learner
and any facilitator(s) of learning, there is a mutual responsibility. All
parties are empowered to achieve the principles which follow. Yet, at the same
time, the facilitator(s) of learning are expected to take the lead in ensuring
both the quality of the learning experience and of the work produced, and in
supporting the learner to use the principles, which underlie the pedagogy of
experiential education.
- Intention:
All parties must be clear from the outset why experience is the chosen
approach to the learning that is to take place and to the knowledge that
will be demonstrated, applied or result from it. Intention represents the
purposefulness that enables experience to become knowledge and, as such, is
deeper than the goals, objectives, and activities that define the
experience.
- Preparedness
and Planning: Participants must ensure that they enter the experience with
sufficient foundation to support a successful experience. They must also
focus from the earliest stages of the experience/program on the identified
intentions, adhering to them as goals, objectives and activities are
defined. The resulting plan should include those intentions and be referred
to on a regular basis by all parties. At the same time, it should be
flexible enough to allow for adaptations as the experience unfolds.
- Authenticity:
The experience must have a real world context and/or be useful and
meaningful in reference to an applied setting or situation. This means that
is should be designed in concert with those who will be affected by or use
it, or in response to a real situation.
- Reflection:
Reflection is the element that transforms simple experience to a learning
experience. For knowledge to be discovered and internalized the learner must
test assumptions and hypotheses about the outcomes of decisions and actions
taken, then weigh the outcomes against past learning and future
implications. This reflective process is integral to all phases of
experiential learning, from identifying intention and choosing the
experience, to considering preconceptions and observing how they change as
the experience unfolds. Reflection is also an essential tool for adjusting
the experience and measuring outcomes.
- Orientation
and Training: For the full value of the experience to be accessible to both
the learner and the learning facilitator(s), and to any involved
organizational partners, it is essential that they be prepared with
important background information about each other and about the context and
environment in which the experience will operate. Once that baseline of
knowledge is addressed, ongoing structured development opportunities should
also be included to expand the learner’s appreciation of the context and
skill requirements of her/his work.
- Monitoring
and Continuous Improvement: Any learning activity will be dynamic and
changing, and the parties involved all bear responsibility for ensuring that
the experience, as it is in process, continues to provide the richest
learning possible, while affirming the learner. It is important that there
be a feedback loop related to learning intentions and quality objectives and
that the structure of the experience be sufficiently flexible to permit
change in response to what that feedback suggests. While reflection provides
input for new hypotheses and knowledge based in documented experience, other
strategies for observing progress against intentions and objectives should
also be in place. Monitoring and continuous improvement represent the
formative evaluation tools.
- Assessment
and Evaluation: Outcomes and processes should be systematically documented
with regard to initial intentions and quality outcomes. Assessment is a
means to develop and refine the specific learning goals and quality
objectives identified during the planning stages of the experience, while
evaluation provides comprehensive data about the experiential process as a
whole and whether it has met the intentions which suggested it.
- Acknowledgment:
Recognition of learning and impact occur throughout the experience by way of
the reflective and monitoring processes and through reporting, documentation
and sharing of accomplishments. All parties to the experience should be
included in the recognition of progress and accomplishment. Culminating
documentation and celebration of learning and impact help provide closure
and sustainability to the experience.
Source: National Society for Experiential Education.
http://www.nsee.org/about_us.htm
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Francis
Marion University
