8 Things to Know

About the

Experiential
Learning Cycle

ALICE & DAVID KOLB

EXPERIENCE BASED LEARNING SYSTEMS
EBLS Press publishes an e-book series on applications of ELT in
education and personal development and a scholarly
monograph series on the theory of experiential learning. The
first of the monograph series: DKTE: William James' Dual
Knowing Theory of Experience – The first Principle of
Experiential Learning Theory is currently in preparation.

Kaunakakai, Hawaii 96748

© Alice and David Kolb 2023
TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction .................................................................................................................4

1) Learning Is an Endlessly Recurring Cycle Not a Linear Process ...............................5

2) Experiencing Is Necessary for Learning....................................................................7

3) The Brain Is Built for Learning From Experience ....................................................9

4) The Dialectic Poles of the Learning Cycle Are What Motivate Learning ................ 11

5) Learning Styles Are Different Ways of Going Around the Learning Cycle .............. 13

6) Full Cycle Learning Increases Learning Flexibility and Development .................... 15

7) Teaching Around the Learning Cycle With Dynamic Matching of Teaching Role .. 17

8) The Learning Cycle Can Be a Rubric for Holistic, Authentic Assessment ............... 21

References .................................................................................................................. 22

Experience Based Learning Systems ........................................................................... 24

INTRODUCTION
Experiential Learning Theory (ELT) was created to provide an intellectual foundation for
the practice of experiential learning responding to John Dewey’s call for a theory of
experience to guide educational innovation. ELT is a synthesis of the works of those great
20th century scholars who gave experience a central role in their theories of human
learning and development. We have come to call them the “foundational scholars of
experiential learning” – William James, John Dewey, Kurt Lewin, Jean Piaget, Lev
Vygotsky, Carl Jung, Mary Parker Follett, Carl Rogers and Paulo Freire.
The experiential learning cycle is the most widely recognized
and used concept in ELT (ELT-Kolb 2015, Kolb & Kolb 2017). The
simplicity and usefulness of the four-stage cycle of Experiencing,
Reflecting, Thinking and Acting are the main reason for its
popularity. It is an adaptable template for the creation of
educational programs that actively engage learners in the learning
process, providing an alternative to the overused and ineffective
traditional information transmission model.
In a typical application of experiential learning the educator provides a direct concrete
experiencing event, such as a field trip, a lab experiment, or a role play, and then
organizes personal or group reflection on the experience. The conceptualization phase
focuses on understanding the meaning of the experience often with the addition of
related subject matter lectures or reading. Learners are then asked to apply what they
have learned in their own life and work context.
There have been countless applications of the learning cycle concept in educational
programs ranging from individual class sessions, to courses and training programs, to
degree programs, to the total school and university curriculum, and even to national
curricular policies and standards in places like New Zealand (NZ Ministry of Education
2004) Singapore (Singapore Ministry of Education 2015) and Vietnam (Uyen et. al. 2022).
Some, however, have criticized the learning cycle for this simplicity and usefulness;
calling it “laughable” that a process as complex as learning could be described in four
stages. The learning process is indeed complex, described by Duch (2021) as multiple
layers of factors that influence learning from genes and proteins to neurotransmitters to
neurons, to neural networks to sensory-motor activity to cognition and finally to learning
styles which he considers as a useful high-level organizing typology of the learning
process.
In our own work we have met a number of colleagues who have used the learning
cycle in their teaching for many years based on a cursory understanding and what they
have learned about it from popular reports. When we explained the deeper foundations
of the learning cycle in ELT to them, they
saw new perspectives on their practice and
discovered new ways to improve their
teaching with experiential learning.
In this book, and accompanying video,
we have identified eight things to know
about this simple, practical learning cycle
to enhance your understanding and
appreciation of the holistic nature and
https://youtu.be/46UkXjbAqG8
rich concepts included in ELT.

4 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

LEARNING IS AN ENDLESSLY RECURRING CYCLE NOT A
1
LINEAR PROCESS
The first thing to know is that the learning cycle is an endlessly recurring process of
exchange between the learner’s internal world and the external environment. Learning is
like breathing; a lifelong process of taking in and putting out. For educators it about
impression and expression–impressing learners with the knowledge necessary to live and
work in today’s world and coaching them to express what they have learned in highly
skilled ways.
The learning cycle describes the
learning process as a recursive circle or
spiral as opposed to the linear, traditional
information transmission model of
learning used in most education where
information is transferred from the teacher
to the learner to be is stored in declarative
memory for later recall. Paulo Freire called
this the “banking concept of education”
where ideas are deposited in the minds of
passive learners.
In the linear model the learner is a
passive recipient of information whereas
in the cycle of learning learners receive
information through concrete experiences
and transform it through reflection and
conceptualization and then transform it
again through their actions to change the world, including what information they choose
to attend to in the new experience. They are both receivers of information and creators of
information.
A Google image search of “learning cycle” or “experiential learning cycle” produces a
seemingly endless array of reproductions and variations of the cycle from around the
world adapted to different contexts and educational situations. Many are modifications of
the ELT learning cycle while others vary in their number of stages in the process and their
labels for them. There are two stage cycles – e.g. experience and reflect; three stage
cycles – e.g.do, review and plan other four stage models – e.g.do it, what, so what, and
now what.
And there are five stage cycles – engage, explore, explain, elaborate and evaluate; six
stage cycles – e.g. establish desired outcomes, define the questions, collect and organize
data, make meaning of the data, take action, assess and evaluate options; and an eight-
stage cycle – connect, attend, imagine, inform, practice, extend, refine and perform; and
one with more stages than we can count.
Viewed holistically, all of these cycles emphasize an important point – that learning is
not a linear stimulus-response process but the cybernetic feedback loop process that in
different ways they describe. Yet, nearly all do not include experiencing in their cycle or
see the relevance of experience for learning.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 5

 A number of the cycles seem to equate experiencing with doing while others have no
place for experiencing at all. The experiencing mode of the ELT learning cycle is widely
misunderstood; however, as you will discover next, it is a central component in this
theory and has particular significance for learning.

Organize your course or curriculum as a series of learning

cycles to form a deepening spiral of learning that expands in
complexity and application. The learning modes are revisited,
and students' understanding is developed further each time.
They discover more about the practical limits and the wider
applications of their new knowledge by taking what they have
learned in one situation and using it in another.
The New Zealand Ministry of Education organized its middle school around this
learning cycle spiral.

6 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

EXPERIENCING IS NECESSARY FOR LEARNING
2
William James and John Dewey highlight key differences between
two kinds of experience: James’ concept of pure experience—in
the moment perceptual experiencing of the world “just as it is”
without conceptual interpretation (1912), and Dewey’s concept of
empirical experience—the on-going, often unexamined, daily flow
of experience that is laden with cultural interpretation and is
conservative, tradition bound and prone to conformity and
dogmatism (1933).
The culture laden flow of empirical experience produces rote
or surface learning, a preoccupation with unreflective strategies,
such as memorizing without understanding and uncritically
following teachers’ instructions or an intention to learn facts in
order to pass a course with a lack of interest and engagement.
Experiencing, on the other hand, stimulates a deep learning
approach as obstacles and surprises promote intrinsic interest in
understanding by gathering information, relating ideas to each
other and drawing conclusions (Marton & Saljo, 1976; Ramsden,
1992; Biggs, 1987; Entwistle, 1981)
Everyday experience and behavior are notoriously conservative and automatic, being
habitual and culturally mediated by many previous trips around the learning cycle.
Experience can appear fresh and new but it is saturated with the interpretations of past
generations.

"The people who ‘learn by experience’ often make great messes of their lives, that is, if they
apply what they have learned from a past incident to the present, deciding from certain
appearances that the circumstances are the same, forgetting that no two situations can ever
be the same. We must put everything we can into the fresh experience...We integrate our
experience, then the richer human being that we are goes into the experience--again we give
ourselves and always by giving rise above the old self."
– Mary Parker Follett, Creative Experience (1924)

John Dewey emphasized that to initiate reflection and learning this normal flow of
experience must be interrupted by deep experiencing, such as when we are “stuck” with a
problem or difficulty or “struck” by the strangeness of something outside of our usual
experience. William James called this “pure experience”.
The great Japanese Zen philosopher Kitaro Nishada defined pure experience this way
“What we usually refer to as experience is adulterated with some sort of thought, so by
pure I am referring to the state of experience just as it is, without the least addition of
deliberative discrimination. The moment of seeing a color or hearing a sound, for example, is
prior not only to the thought that the color or sound is the activity of an external object or that
one is sensing it, but also to the judgment of what the color or sound might be. In this regard,
pure experience is identical with direct experience. When one directly experiences one’s own
state of consciousness, there is not yet a subject or an object, and knowing and its object are
completely united. This is the most refined type of experience.” (1990:3)

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 7

 While many have stressed that critical reflection is of primary importance for learning
from experience; we see here that a concrete “pure” experience that violates the
expectations of previous convictions and habits of thought is necessary to activate such
reflection in the first place; suggesting that experience short of habit and cultural
interpretation is necessary for learning anything new.
While some learning probably occurs from everyday experience, it is probably the kind
that reinforces previous conclusions or refines thought or behavior in small ways. For
bigger changes in beliefs and behavior a “shock” that disrupts life may be required.

As educators it is important to create learning experiences

such as field projects, role plays and other experiential
exercises where learners are experiencing and not just going
through the motions of a class exercise.
The experiential approach places the subject to be
learned in the center to be experienced by both the
educator and learner.
Parker Palmer put it this way, “The subject-centered classroom is
characterized by the fact that the third thing (the subject) has a presence so real,
so vivid, so vocal, that it can hold teacher and students alike accountable for what
they say and do.”
“In such a classroom there are no inert facts. The great thing is so alive that
teacher can turn to student or student to teacher, and either can make a claim on
the other in the name of that great thing.”
“Here teacher and students have a power beyond themselves to contend with–
the power of a subject that transcends our self-absorption and refuses to be
reduced to our claims about it." (Palmer 1998: 117)
The "vivid presence" of Parker Palmer's subject-centered classroom is a
powerful solution to what has become a crisis of student engagement in schools
all around the world. Teachers are teaching, but students are disengaged.
A recent Grattan Institute report suggested that as many as 40% of Australian
students are consistently disengaged in class, and that these students are one to
two years behind their peers in academic performance. The report also identified
that the majority of disengaged students do not actively disrupt the class, but
rather tend to be unmotivated and off-task without attracting the teacher’s
attention (Mann, 2018, p. 169). Gross measures of student disengagement such as
non-attendance, disruptive behavior and poor performance can be traced in part
to a failure to productively engage in the learning process itself.

8 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

 Engaging students in learning is proving even more difficult in online learning.
Yet, a number of recent studies are showing that social, cognitive and teacher
presence, experiential learning and active participation can increase online
engagement in learning (Martin et al., 2018; Dunlap et al., 2016; Krassmann et al.,
2019). The 4-item short Experiencing Scale can be a useful guide and monitoring
device to gauge the ongoing level of experiencing in an online session reminding
learners to be fully present with focused attention in the here-and now and to
participate in the class.
With Karen Stock we have developed The Experiencing Scale: An Experiential
Learning Gauge of Engagement in Learning. In an earlier study (Stock, 2014) first
examined the role of experiencing in a study of participants in an equine-assisted
management development program.
The findings indicated that experiencing significantly mediated the
relationships between program characteristics--learner centered facilitation,
psychological safety and the natural setting–and post-program outcomes of
increased critical reflection and creativity. Encouraged by these findings, we set
out to build a more rigorous Experiencing Scale derived from the broader
literature on experiencing. We identified four distinct traditions of experiencing
research–Focusing, Flow, Mindfulness and Absorption. Each of these traditions
has generated a large body of scholarly research and Focusing, Flow and
Mindfulness, in particular, have seen many programs of practical application
aimed at developing a state of experiencing.

THE BRAIN IS BUILT FOR LEARNING FROM EXPERIENCE

3
A number of studies have examined the
relationship between the learning cycle
and brain functioning (Eagleton 2011,
Duch 2021, McCarthy1987), but the most
systematic examination of the
neurological basis of the learning cycle is
James Zull’s research reported in his two
great books The Art of Changing the Brain
(2002) and From Brain to Mind (2011).
Zull’s aim was to understand how
Piaget’s concept of constructivism in
learning could be understood in neurological terms. His basic idea was that knowledge
resides in networks of neurons in the neo-cortex constructed through learning from
experience. Learning from experience results in modification, growth, and pruning of
neurons, synapses and neuronal networks; thus learning physically changes the brain and
educating is the art of changing the brain.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 9

 Zull saw a parallel between the learning cycle and the structure of the nervous system
that creates the neuronal networks. “...concrete experiences come through the sensory
cortex, reflective observation involves the integrative cortex at the back, creating new
abstract concepts occurs in the frontal integrative cortex, and active testing involves the
motor brain."
“In other words, the learning cycle arises from the structure of the brain.” (Zull 2002:
18-19; 2011).
Concrete experience (CE) and sensing in the sensory cortex. The sensory cortex
receives information from the outside world through the senses.
Reflective observation (RO) and remembering in the back integrative cortex.
The back integrative cortex integrates sensory information to create images and
meaning.
Abstract conceptualization (AC) and theorizing in the front integrative cortex.
The frontal integrative cortex uses short term memory to choose, plan, problem solve and
make decisions to accomplish a goal.
Active experimentation (AE) and acting in the motor cortex. Action closes the
learning cycle and reconnects the processing inside the brain with the world. It generates
consequences that create new experiences that begin the cycle anew.
While acknowledging the greater complexity of brain functioning, Zull proposed that
these regions of the brain were heavily, but not exclusively involved in the modes of the
learning cycle. Their respective functions, sensing, remembering, theorizing, and acting
he called the four pillars of learning.

Building curricula with the 4 pillars.

There have been many educational applications of the 4

pillars model including a team at the University of
Strathclyde's Center for Lifelong Learning who built their
curriculum with the pillars naming them Gathering,
Reflecting, Creating & Testing.

10 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

 Tips on the art of changing the brain.

Zull’s books are filled with implications and recommendations for educators and
learners. Here are a few related to experiential learning.

• Learning how to learn should be a focus of education.

• The opportunities for deep learning are enhanced with a balanced use of all
four learning modes and their corresponding parts of the brain.
• The learning cycle’s four modes give four times the chance to remember since
it is a metacognitive process and produces episodic memories that aid
transfer of learning.
• “Sense-luscious” real experiences that flood all the senses are the best for
learning. Rich experiences, such as those which change and surprise are more
memorable.
• Physical changes occur in the brain when we learn. Begin with existing
neuronal networks which are the physical form of prior knowledge and build
on it.
• Emotion influences thinking more than thinking influences emotion. Positive
emotions (joy) enhance learning.
• Be careful to not overload the limited capacity of working memory. Shoving
information in at one end only pushes out information at the other.
• Always provoke an active reaction from learners. A safe environment for
failure can support this norm.

THE DIALECTIC POLES OF THE LEARNING CYCLE ARE WHAT

4
MOTIVATE LEARNING
What makes the learning cycle go? What motivates us to learn? The answers to these
questions lie in the dialectic poles of opposing modes of the learning cycle:
Experiencing – Thinking and Reflecting – Acting
Concrete sensory experience and abstract thinking are two fundamentally different
ways of understanding experience. William James (1977) called these percepts and
concepts.
Perception exists in here and now; conceptions point to the past or future. James uses
the analogy of a pair of scissors–in the same way we need both blades to cut, we need
both concrete experience and abstract thinking to make sense of the world.
Because of the dialectic competition between experiencing and thinking, how deeply
one is engaged in experiencing depends on both the thinking and experiencing modes.
In the experiencing mode of grasping or understanding the world, we understand the
world immediately and directly through an exquisite system of perceptual senses that
include the big five senses of vision, hearing, touch, taste and smell, plus a host of lesser-
known senses of direction and balance, kinesthetic proprioception, pain, and internal
body functions including feelings and emotions.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 11

 “In this regard, pure experience is identical with direct experience.” (Nishida, 1990, p.3)
This is in contrast to the thinking mode
where understanding of the world is
grasped through remembered ideas and
concepts.
The idea that experiencing and
thinking are dual modes of understanding
the world is consistent with a number of
contemporary dual processing theories in
cognitive psychology (Evans, 2008); most
notably Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast
and Slow (2011).
Kahneman says we have two selves, an
experiencing self that lives briefly in each
moment of perception and a remembering/
thinking self that is constructed through remembered memories of concrete experiences
that have been given meaning through cognitive interpretation. Unlike the experiencing
self, the remembering/thinking self is relatively stable and permanent.
“It is a basic fact of the human condition that memories are what we get to keep from our
experience, and the only perspective we can adopt as we think about our lives is that of the
remembering/thinking self.” (Kahneman & Riis, 2005, p. 286).
The learning cycle integrates the experiencing self and thinking self through the
transformation dimension of reflection and action.
Reflecting and acting are similarly opposing ways of transforming this understanding.
The great educator Paulo Freire, by stressing the importance of naming one’s own
experience in dialogue with others, gives emphasis to praxis, the transformative dialectic
between reflection and action–reflection informed by action and action informed by
reflection,
“As we attempt to analyze dialogue as a human phenomenon.Within the word we find two
dimensions, reflection and action, in such radical interaction that if
one is sacrificed, even in part, the other immediately suffers. When a
word is deprived of its dimension of action, reflection automatically
suffers as well; and the word is changed into idle chatter, into
verbalism, into an alienated and alienating 'blah'. When action is
emphasized exclusively, to the detriment of reflection, the word is
converted into activism. The latter action for action's sake negates the
true praxis and makes dialogue impossible.” (1992:75-78)
Just as the classic dialectic process of thesis-antithesis-
synthesis results in new integrative insights, so the meeting of direct experience and
abstract thought motivates a search for integration of the two perspectives on one’s
experience.As Dewey said, the “shock and awe” of an intense experience can cause
reconsideration of an entrenched belief, while a new idea can reshape the way we
experience things.
These opposing dialectic poles give us a “stereo” perspective that motivates learning.
When one pole dominates the other, learning ceases. Hyper-activity or withdrawal into
reflection both inhibit learning. Reflection on the consequences of action can serve to
correct errors and refine future actions while acting on reflections can inform incessant
rumination. Dogmatic beliefs that are closed to new experience or total immersion in
experience clouds clear thought.

12 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

 This can be thought of as an internal conversation between the perspectives of the
experiencing and thinking selves.

Use the dialectics to motivate learning.

• Design educational programs to engage the dialectic

polarities of the cycle. For example, to a concrete and
active internship program add systematic reflection
and conceptual analysis.
• Activities that stimulate curiosity and active problem
solving are great motivators for learning.
• Avoid designs that only emphasize one learning mode such as lecture or field
trips with no de-briefing.

5
LEARNING STYLES ARE DIFFERENT WAYS OF GOING AROUND
THE LEARNING CYCLE
Learning style is another popular concept in Experiential Learning
Theory (ELT). It is important because it emphasizes that
individuals learn in different ways and that educators can better
facilitate their students’ learning if they understand these unique
differences. The idea is much discussed in education today and
there is considerable confusion about its usefulness, in part
because there has been a proliferation of over 100 learning style instruments that vary
widely in their conceptual basis and psychometric soundness. Criticism of the concept
has tended to lump all these approaches together (Scott 2010), resulting in some
misunderstanding of the unique nature of the ELT learning style concept.Perception
exists in here and now; conceptions point to the past or future. James uses the analogy of
a pair of scissors–in the same way we need both blades to cut, we need both concrete
experience and abstract thinking to make sense of the world.
Learning styles describe a way of using the learning cycle as a familiar, steady state,
emphasizing strengths in some learning modes and underutilization of opposite modes.
The recognition that a style preference is a habitual way of using the process of learning
opens development potentialities and the challenge of full cycle learning–to develop the
ability to engage all modes of the learning cycle in a holistic and fluid manner.
As a result, Experiential Learning style has been mischaracterized as a static trait and
not a dynamic state in the learning cycle process. Styles in ELT are habitual preferences
for the interdependent poles of action and reflection and experiencing and thinking.
Learning style is a habit of learning that is formed when one or more of the learning
modes are preferred over others to shape experience. Seen this way learning style loses
its static stereotype prone character. (Kolb & Kolb 2021, Peterson & Kolb 2017)

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 13

 The Kolb Experiential Learning Profile (KELP) describes the unique ways individuals
spiral through the learning cycle based on their preference for the four different learning
modes–Experiencing, Reflecting, Thinking & Acting). In the KELP a person’s learning
style is defined by their unique combination of preferences for the four learning modes
defining a “kite” shape profile of their relative preference for the four phases of the
learning cycle. Because each person's learning style is unique, everyone's kite shape is a
little different.

The Initiating style - Initiating

action to deal with experiences and
situations.

The Experiencing style - Finding

meaning from deep involvement in
experience.

The Imagining style - Imagining

possibilities by observing and
reflecting on experiences.

The Reflecting style - Connecting

experience and ideas through
sustained reflection.

The Analyzing style - Integrating We have identified 9 typical kite shapes

ideas into concise models and that define 9 learning styles emphasizing
scenarios. different phases of the learning cycle.

The Thinking style - Disciplined

abstract and logical reasoning.

The Deciding style - Using

theories and models to decide on
problem solutions and courses of
action.

The Acting style - Goal-directed

action that integrates people and
tasks.

The Balancing style - Adapting by

weighing the pros and cons of
acting versus reflecting and
experiencing versus thinking.

14 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

 Because of the dialectic dynamics of opposing learning
modes and learning style differences in the way individuals
apply the learning modes, the learning cycle should be
considered an idealized depiction of the learning process
that can vary widely in application. Learners with different
styles may begin with their preferred style and engage the
learning modes in their own way regardless of the
educator’s plan.
Although the idea that learning must always begin with concrete experience
and proceed through the other stages around the cycle is not an iron law; a
number of our experiential educator friends are strong advocates of beginning
learning experiences with a direct concrete experience, and they have strong
arguments for the practice.
They argue that beginning with a shared direct experience “brings the subject
into the room” democratizing the learning process between educator and learners.
In addition, the puzzles or problems presented by direct experience involve
learners and motivate inquiry and reflection, initiating the learning cycle.

FULL CYCLE LEARNING INCREASES LEARNING FLEXIBILITY 6

AND DEVELOPMENT
When one can engage all learning styles in their learning process
they are using the most powerful form of learning that we call full
cycle learning. Full cycle learning is the ability to engage all the
learning style types in a holistic and fluid manner, allowing
learners to engage all modes of the learning cycle as the situation
dictates.
This requires learning flexibility. Many individuals feel that
their learning style accurately describes how they learn most of
the time. They are consistent in their approach to learning.
Others, however, report that they tend to change their learning approach depending on
what they are learning or the situation they are in. They may say, for example, that they
use one style in the classroom and another at home with their friends and family. These
are flexible learners.
Learning flexibility is supportive of learning in different contexts and personal and
professional development over time. By building strengths in non-preferred styles and
parts of the cycle, learners develop a more holistic approach to life.
Learners with high learning flexibility show greater overall flexibility in life. They see
more possibilities in any given moment, they experience less conflict and stress, and they
can handle more complexity. Flexible people are more self-directed, so they are more
likely to make changes that help them adapt to unexpected situations.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 15

 Studies show that some learners can flex their learning styles according to the
demand of different learning tasks and to match the demands of a discipline. Several
studies suggest that in fact students can shift their learning style to match the learning
demands of a particular discipline.
Since a specialized learning style represents an individual preference for only one or
two of the four modes of the learning cycle, its effectiveness is limited to those learning
situations that require these strengths. Learning flexibility indicates the development of a
more holistic and sophisticated learning process.
Following Jung's theory that adult development moves from a specialized way of
adapting toward a holistic integrated way, development in learning flexibility is seen as a
move from specialization to integration.

When planning educational activities, it is useful to

consider the specific learning style skills that you want to
develop in students for each activity to increase their
learning flexibility and full cycle learning capacity. The
KELP includes a measure of learning flexibility and
identifies the “back-up” learning styles that individuals use
to learn different things. This can be useful information for
learners to know in order to set meaningful learning flexibility developmental
goals.
The Institute for Experiential Learning has developed a guide of suggested
strategies educators can use to help learners adopt all learning styles and their
associated capabilities: https://experientiallearninginstitute.org/wp-content/
uploads/2023/09/Educator-Learning-Style-Fleibility-Strategies.pdf
Invite and allow space and time for question-asking by learners, not just
question-answering. Pedrosa de Jesus et al (2007) found that when “stuck or
struck” by different learning environments, learners who are confident and
comfortable in the learning space will initiate questions. By forming and asking
questions, learners are cycling around the learning cycle and engaged in learning.
The content of these questions reveals the learner’s stage of development:
acquisition (to secure knowledge, using 2 modes of learning), specialization (to
generalize into a meaningful pattern, using 3 modes of learning), or integration
(to reorganize concepts into novel patterns and applications, using 4 modes of

learning).
16 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle
TEACHING AROUND THE LEARNING CYCLE WITH DYNAMIC
7
MATCHING OF TEACHING ROLE
The confusion in the learning style
literature has resulted in an over-simplified
prescription for educators to match their
teaching style and methods to the learning
styles of the learner. The dynamic matching
model of ELT is a more complex but more
realistic model for guiding educational
practice. In addition to considering the
relationship between educator and learner
one must also consider the match of
learning approach with the subject matter.
Matching teaching style with learning style
has been shown to be important initially to
connect with and engage learners, but most
learning requires that they continue to actively move around the learning cycle using
other learning styles to acquire increasingly complex knowledge and skills and capacity
to adapt to the wider demands of a given learning environment.
We have created an educator role framework to assist educators in the application of
the ELT concepts of the learning cycle and learning style in the dynamic matching model
of teaching around the learning cycle.
It describes four common educator roles–
Facilitator, Subject Expert, Standard-Setter/
Evaluator and Coach. Most of us adopt each
of these roles to some extent in our
educational and teaching activities. While
the role profile model depicts an idealized
sequential progression through the
educator roles and the learning cycle, in
most cases a curriculum design will be
based on a dynamic or unique sequence of
activities and instructional techniques that
fits the subject matter and learning
objectives that may or may not occur in
such an orderly progression.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 17

The Coaching Role The Facilitator Role

In the coaching role, educators help learners When facilitating, educators help learners
apply knowledge to achieve their goals. They get in touch with their personal experience
adopt a collaborative, encouraging style, and reflect on it. They adopt a warm affirming
often working one-on-one with individuals style to draw out learners’ interests, intrinsic
to help them learn from experiences in their motivation, and self-knowledge. They often
life context. They assist in the creation of do this by facilitating conversation in small
personal development plans and provide groups. They create personal and trusting
ways of getting feedback on performance. relationships with learners.

The Subject Expert Role The Standard-Setter/Evaluator Role

In their role as subject expert, educators As a standard-setter and evaluator, educators

help learners organize and connect their help learners master the application of knowledge
reflections to the knowledge base of the and skill in order to meet performance
subject matter. They adopt an authoritative, requirements. They adopt an objective results-
reflective style. They often teach by example, oriented style as they set the knowledge
modeling and encouraging critical thinking requirements needed for quality performance.
as they systematically organize and analyze They create performance activities for learners
the subject matter knowledge. This knowledge to evaluate their learning.
is often communicated through lectures
and texts.

18 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

 Using the Educator Role framework to guide learners around the learning cycle is a
high art; and you the educator are its prime instrument. How can we best promote
learning for our students?
Should we be learner-centered and love our students into learning by creating
hospitable learning spaces to draw out their budding interests?
Should be we subject-centered and fully deliver the richness and depth of our special
knowledge, developing learners’ capacity for reflective thinking about our field?
Should we focus on the pragmatic applications and implications of the ideas we
present for the learner and the world; or
Should the emphasis be on the deep meaning of these ideas and concepts, their
origins and connections to other ideas and fields of study?
In the abstract we would probably answer all four questions affirmatively, and in a
practical context there are very real constraints that require trade-offs between the
learner and subject focus and the action and meaning focus–time limitations, learner
needs, the amount of subject matter to be “covered”, its complexity and required
evaluation standards to name a few and your own teaching role preferences and skills.

Our Turkish colleagues Ilke Gencel and Mustafa Erdogan.

(Gencel, Erdogan, et. al. 2021 have developed the first
comprehensive rubric for assessing the quality of an
educational experience in two dimensions. One of these
components is the concept of Learning Spaces, and the
other is the concept of Educator Roles.
Learning spaces refer to the learning habitat that is
necessary for an experiential learning-based curriculum. Unless this habitat is
built holistically, the learning process in it will not be entirely experiential.
The Kolb Educator Role Profile (KERP-2011) roles suggest a framework for
teaching around the learning cycle with dynamic matching, shifting roles to help
learners complete the learning cycle.
For this reason, while learning spaces define the ecosystem of the curriculum,
educator role profiles emphasize the roles that the educators play in this
ecosystem.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 19

 The Gencel-Erogan rubric is below, showing the sub-components of Learning
Space and Educator Roles and the quality criteria for assessing them.

LEARNING SPACES

Creating a hospitable learning space

Getting to know each other

Group dynamic
Basic rules
Creating a learner-centered space

Expectations & contributions

Methodology
Participant assessment
Creating a ludic learning space

Energizers
Learning games
Having fun
Creating a conversational
learning space

Discussion
Analysis
Natural development of conversation
Creating a space for reflective
thinking

From dualism to multiplicity

From multiplicity to relativism
From relativism to commitment
Creating spaces to develop &
maintain deep learning

Learning flexibility
Development stages

20 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

THE LEARNING CYCLE CAN BE A RUBRIC FOR HOLISTIC, 8
AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENT
Authentic assessment means learners should demonstrate knowledge and skills in their
real-life context. The goal of authentic evaluation is to draw education close to real life. If
we want our assessment of students to be authentic, the subject centered question, “what
should my students know?” can only be appropriately addressed in conjunction with the
learner-centered question “How can I help my students learn skills and knowledge and be
able to transfer what they have learned in real life context?”
The multidimensional teaching and learning strategies of experiential learning require
equally diverse and complex assessment methods that adequately and fairly evaluate
students’ integrated functioning in the learning process. Assessment becomes holistic
when the focus is on all four of the learning modes. In contrast to lecture-based
traditional education which relies primarily on the one-size-fit-all evaluation of the
abstract dimension of performance, experiential learning is holistic based upon students’
effective integration of the affective, perceptual, cognitive, and behavioral dimensions of
learning.

A Tip for Educators. Try using the Personal Application

Assignment available at:
https://learningfromexperience.com/research-library/
evaluating-experiential-learning-the-personal-application-
assignment/
The Personal Application Assignment (PAA) is an essay/
journal based holistic, authentic assessment rubric using
the learning cycle framework. In the PAA participants:

• Select an experience, occurring either in or out of the training session,

and chronicle the actual events of the experience.
• Review their thoughts and feelings about the experience, making
observations about it from a fresh perspective.
• Develop concepts or theories that make sense of the experience.
• Create future action plans based on what they have learned from
the experience.

The rubric includes a scoring system for grading the essays.

8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 21

REFERENCES
Włodzisław Duch (2021) “Experiential Learning Styles and Neurocognitive Phenomics”
Brain and Education Nicolaus Copernicus University

Dunlap, J. C., Verma, G., & Johnson, H. L. (2016). “Presence + experience: A framework for
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Eagleton S. & Muller A. (2011). “Development of a model for whole brain learning of
physiology.” Adv Physiol Educ 35: 421-426, 2011; https://doi:10.1152/advan.00007.2011

Freire, P. (1992). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuum.

Lily (Xuehui) Gao, Evert de Haan, E Iguacel Melero-Polo & E F. Javier Sese (2022)
“Winning your customers minds and hearts: Disentangling the effects of lock.in and
affective customer experience on retention.” Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11747-022-00898-z

Ilke Evin Gencel, Mustafa Erdogan, Alice Y. Kolb & David A. Kolb (2021) “Rubric for
Experiential Training.” International Journal of Progressive Education, Volume 17 Number 4

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James, W. (1977). “Percept and concept: the import of concepts.” In J. McDermott (Ed.),
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Kolb, A. Y. & Kolb, D. A. (2017). The Experiential Educator: Principles and Practices of
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Kolb, D. A. (2015) Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and

development. 2nd Edition. Upper Saddle River NJ: Pearson Education

Kolb, A. Y. & Kolb, D. A. (2011). The Kolb Experiential Learning Profile (KELP)
add IFEL store link

Krassmann, A. L., Nunes, F. B., Bessa, M., Tarouco, L. M. R., & Bercht, M. (2019, July).
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Mann, J. (2018). “Is school working for teenage boys? Outdoor learning and real-life skills
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22 8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle

McCarthy, B. (1987). The 4-Mat System: Teaching to learning styles with right/left mode
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8 Things to Know About the Experiential Learning Cycle 23

EXPERIENCE BASED LEARNING SYSTEMS

Alice and David Kolb are the principals of Experience Based Learning Systems (EBLS), an
experiential learning research and development organization. For nearly 40 years, in
collaboration with an international network of researchers, practitioners and learning
partners, EBLS has facilitated and curated research on the theory and practice of
experiential learning. Their latest book, The Experiential Educator: Principles and Practices
of Experiential Learning, provides educators with a complete review of the latest research
on experiential learning and a practical guide to the use of experiential learning in
education. EBLS has developed two new personal development self-assessment tools, The
Kolb Experiential Learning Profile for learners and the Kolb Educator Role Profile to help
educators apply experiential learning principles in their work. The KELP is distributed by
the Institute for Experiential Learning.