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Experiential Learning Resources (for Faculty and Staff)

Getting Started

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Experiential learning provides learners real world and hands-on opportunities preparing them for an ever-changing and diverse world. The purpose of experiential learning is to actively engage the learner through relevant and ongoing experience, critical problem solving and reflective practices. Learners who engage in experiential learning are more likely to persist through their college experience, graduate, and become lifelong, self-directed learners.

Getting Support: EL @ NMC

NMC EL cyclical model: Experience, Share, Process, Generalize, Apply

Resources & Materials

Books

Experiential Learning

A foundational text in the realm of EL, authored by one of the field's foremost authorities. This new edition reviews recent applications of experiential learning, updates Kolb's framework for today's organizational and educational landscape, and features new examples in the field and classroom.

Experience and Education

"The great educational theorist's most concise statement of his ideas about the needs, the problems, and the possibilities of education -- written after his experience with the progressive schools and in light of the criticisms his theories received."

The Experiential Educator

"This comprehensive handbook examines the philosophy of experiential learning as expressed in the works of foundational scholars from William James and John Dewey to Carl Rogers and Paulo Freire. [The authors] explore the basic concepts of experiential learning theory, describing the current state-of-the-art research and practice...[and] application of these principles to promote individual, team, and organizational learning."

Teaching for Experiential Learning

"This book describes how to change the way in which educators conduct business in the classroom. Our current educational systems lack ways to reach today's learners in relevant, meaningful ways. The five approaches in this book inspire and motivate students to learn. The authors provide in-depth descriptions into these overlapping approaches for experiential learning: active learning, problem-based learning, project-based learning, service learning, and place-based education. Each of these five approaches includes an element of student involvement and attempts to engage students in solving problems. The chapters are presented in a consistent, easy-to-read format that provides descriptions, history, research, ways to use the approach, and resources. This book will help educators transform their classrooms into dynamic learning environments."

A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning

"This handbook acts as an essential guide to understanding and using reflective and experiential learning...locating them within an overall theoretical framework for learning and exploring the relationships between different approaches."

The Experiential Learning Toolkit

"The Experiential Learning Toolkit presents a very diverse range of practical exercises, which are based on the major theories of experiential learning. By being routed in the core principles of this method of learning, the activities create more engaging, effective and embedded learning...The coverage includes a wide range of training needs and topics including: effective customer service training and telephone skills; outdoor learning, including service learning; negotiating and assertiveness skills; strategic and higher level thinking; effective presentation skills; developing innovative and creative minds."

How You Learn Is How You Live

Written by Kay Peterson and David Kolb of the Institute for Experiential Learning (IFEL), "How You Learn is How You Live" makes the connection between experiential and life-long learning, framing EL as a lens for growth and transformation both within and beyond the classroom.

Journals

Articles

Organizations (State, National, Int'l)