Foundational Elements of Experiential Education Through an Inclusive Lens

  • Frames: Frames create meaning & context
  • Student Agency: voice, choice & authority
  • Aligned with Outcomes: clear, intentional and measurable
  • Reflection: meaningful metacognition
  • Application: making meaning through doing
    Uncertainty: becoming comfortable with the process
  • Learning centric: open to learning with students
  • Flexibility: plan carefully, but remain open to serendipity

High Impact Practices

Research shows that students involved in high-impact practices (HIPs) enjoy higher levels of learning success. These evidence-based practices include service learning, undergraduate research, and internships—to name a few. AAC&U’s Institute on High-Impact Practices and Student Success helps campus teams refine and assess their HIPs with an emphasis on quality, equity, and student engagement. Attendees participate in intentional reflection on institutional outcomes, develop comprehensive action plans, and have individualized consultations with HIPs faculty. The institute helps campus and system-level teams create sustainable student success goals and monitor progress toward achieving equity to improve educational outcomes for all students.

(Adapted from AAC&U)

Capstone Courses and Projects

These culminating experiences require students nearing the end of their college years to create a project synthesizing what they’ve learned. The project might be a research paper, a performance, a portfolio of “best work,” or an exhibit of artwork. Capstones are offered both in departmental programs and, increasingly, in general education as well.

Collaborative Assignments and Projects

Collaborative learning combines two key goals: learning to work and solve problems in the company of others and sharpening one’s own understanding by listening seriously to the insights of others, especially those with different backgrounds and life experiences.

Common Intellectual Experiences

These experiences within an organized general education program that includes introductory courses, advanced interdisciplinary courses, capstones, and internships/practicums/field experience.

Diversity/Global Learning

Diversity/Global Learning—which may address US diversity, world cultures, or both—often explore “difficult differences” such as racial, ethnic, and gender inequality, or continuing struggles around the globe for human rights, freedom, and power.

Internships

Internships are an increasingly common form of experiential learning. The idea is to provide students with direct experience in a work setting—usually related to their career interests—and to give them the benefit of supervision and coaching from professionals in the field. If the internship is taken for course credit, students complete a project or paper that is approved by a faculty member.

ePortfolios

 ePortfolios enable students to electronically collect their work over time, reflect upon their personal and academic growth, and then share selected items with others, including professors, advisors, and potential employers.

Learning Communities

Students will address “wicked problems” in interdisciplinary courses where they will collaborate as a group working closely with one another and with their professors. Many learning communities explore a common topic and/or common readings through the lenses of different disciplines. Some deliberately link “liberal arts” and “professional courses”; others feature service learning.

First-Year Seminars and Experiences

University Experience 101 is our first-year course where students engage in our University of Maine at Presque Isle community.

Service Learning and Community-Based Learning

Students engage in field-based “experiential learning” with community partners is an instructional strategy—and often a required part of the course where they are learning in real-world settings and reflecting in a classroom setting on their service learning.

Writing Intensive Courses

Students are encouraged to produce and revise various forms of writing for different audiences in different disciplines throughout the General Education Curriculum. 

Undergraduate Research

Connecting key concepts and questions with students’ early and active involvement in investigation and research to involve students with questions, observation, and the sense of excitement that comes from working to answer important questions.

Aligned Pedagogy

UMPI has long embraced a student-centered approach to teaching and learning that prioritizes personalized learning and hands-on, relevant experiences–which is why experiential teaching methods are such a great fit. 

In addition to academic programs that (by their very nature) incorporate experiential learning, such as education, biology, environmental science, fine art, and business administration, UMPI has embraced experiential teaching as a foundational element in all of our General Education courses.

Infuse Active Learning

Follow UMichigan’s guidance to incorporate more active learning in your classroom!

Group students more effectively

NextGen Learning’s grouping strategies for experiential learning.

Assess Experiential Learning

Check out MCGill University’s guidelines to experiential learning assessment!

Experiential learning online

eLearning Industry gives us a handbook on ‘How-To’

Design for Experiential Learning

Backward design is a planning framework that can be used to design an experiential learning course. In backward design, the course is designed by starting with the desired learning outcomes and then working backward to determine the instructional activities and assessments that will help students achieve those outcomes.

To use backward design for an experiential learning course, you would begin by clearly defining the learning outcomes or objectives that you want students to achieve. These outcomes should reflect the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that students will develop through the experiential learning activities.

Once the learning outcomes are established, you can then identify the types of experiential learning activities that will help students achieve those outcomes. These activities could include fieldwork, simulations, case studies, group projects, or any other hands-on experiences that align with the desired learning outcomes.

Let’s review Grant Wiggins guidance on designing with the end in mind:

Aligned Practices

Constructivism

Blended Learning

Events of Instruction

Frequently Asked Questions

Definitely not! With some small adjustments to some of the work you are already doing in your courses, you can integrate the Experiential Learning cycle into your learning activities.

The Association of Experiential Education defines experiential learning as “[e]xperiential learning occurs when carefully chosen experiences are supported by reflection, critical analysis and synthesis” (aee.org).

“Active learning is an umbrella term for a range of instructional strategies aimed at increasing student involvement and ownership of their learning” (Roberts, 47).

Yes, both are examples of experiential learning with the framing of the activities as well as a reflection component to help make the learning visible.

Experiential learning is a good fit for all disciplines.

Considering experiential activities for our online courses takes some more planning, but we have the resources to help you take your online class there.

Start with reading some experiential education literature and perusing our website along with other sites about experiential education. This will help you begin the process of understanding experiential education. Then, reach out to CTL at umpi-ctl@maine.edu to talk about how to make this work with your style of teaching in your discipline.