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Exploring Theory: Experiential Learning

Breannah Gammon
California State University Sacramento

Aristotle wrote in his Nicomachean Ethics, “For the things we have to learn before we

can do them, we learn by doing them.” This, while the great philosopher wouldn’t have known it

as such, is a statement of experiential learning. Experiential learning is a theory that was

originally developed by David A. Kolb, drawing heavily from previous work by John Dewey.

This learning theory involves learning by doing and reflection. Kolb looked at learning as

something that could happen both in formal situations, as in the classroom, and in informal

situations like through life lessons and mentorship. According to Aubrey and Riley in

Undertsanding & Using Educational Theories (2016),

“Kolb saw learning as ‘the process whereby knowledge is created through the

transformation of experience and… saw learning as proceeding through concrete

experiences which were then transformed into abstract conceptualism through the process

if reflective observation and active experimentation.” (p. 156)

Here we can also see the stages of experiential learning as laid out by Kolb, concrete experience,

reflective observation, abstract conceptualism, and active experimentation. If art educators can

incorporate experiential learning into their classrooms by using art as a method of research

relating it to other subjects as means of taking into consideration the stages of experiential

learning and students’ learning styles, students would be able to better understand concepts and

ideas. In Maria Letsiou’s publication in the International Journal of education through Art, “Art

as research; Defending the significance of art practice in high school” (2016) and in Anne

Douglas’ article in ART, Design & Communication in Higher Education, “Experiential

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knowledge and improvisation: Variations in movement, motion, and emotion” (2011)

experiential learning is examined and employed in two very distinct ways, through art as

research in the classroom and as research in art making.

Letsiou and in Classroom Art as Research as Experiential Learning

In Letsiou’s (2016) article the educator uses experiential learning as a part of her art

projects in two of her classes. Using art practice as a method of research for two separate projects

for the two groups of students, an eighth-grade class and a tenth-grade class.

“The concept of art practice as research holds the promise of comprehension and

construction of knowledge through discrete but related processes and methods, as

happens when research skills coexist with creativity and imagination.” (p. 242)

By using art making as a conduit for students’ research they are forced to experience the topics

addressed whether that be social, political, or personal, in such a way that allows them to

understand much more deeply, because they use comprehension and imagination, than they

would have from reading about the topic alone. Letsiou (2016) describes three aspects of art

education that she feels work in conjunction particularly well with experiential learning. These

thee tools, as she calls them, are “the production of images and objects, the use of images as

sources of information and knowledge, [and] an approach to research that uses the metaphor of

research process as art.” (Letsiou, 2016, p. 243) These steps relate to teaching with the cycle of

experiential learning because the student is having a concrete experience in research and image

gathering, practicing reflective observation by creating art works to reflect the information and

knowledge gathered, bringing that knowledge into abstract conceptualization by creating their

own visual representations, and taking part in active experimentation by trying out different
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methods of art making in order to express what they have learned. By using these tools educators

are able to integrate art as research into subjects across the board like math and science. Letsiou

(2016) draws from Dewey’s theories to support this;

“Under art practice as research learning tenets, images play a significant role not only in

reconsidering students’ identity formation and attitudes through image-making, but also

in constructing knowledge through image formation as research products. Dewey’s

pragmatist aesthetic emerged from his arguments about reconstructing the traditional

opposition between science and art. He argues that science is art because an inherent

aesthetic quality exists in science and that art is science because art helps people counter

their experiences.” (p. 245)

Dewey emphasizes here that there does not need to be such a distinct difference between how we

approach art and science because they are actually one in the same. By making this connection

across subjects, educators can use a much more effective and holistic approach to teaching any

topic.

The Hexagon Project

Letsiou’s (2016) first project with her students is called “The Hexagon Project” in which

“the concept of art practice as research is reflected in production processes and focus on

materials used in creative investigation and meanings attached to them.” (p. 248) This project

focused on students’ of global themes such as poverty, sexual abuse, recycling, or cyber

bullying. In groups the students chose their theme and investigate it by gathering information and
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creating ways to display their findings visually in a product that would take the form of an art

piece (see image 1) Letsiou (2016) describes her main concern with this project as, “to organize

the experiential learning around a creative process that includes art production. Art production is

derived from a creative research process

that includes gathering information,

critically considering and experimenting

with materials and the conceptual

connections among images, materials, and

concepts.” (p. 249) Art links perfectly

with experiential learning because the art

Image 1
making itself is an experience in which

the student can use for reflection and expression of ideas.

Youth Practice in Youtube

Her other project is entitled “Youth Practices in Youtube”, in this project students in

groups each take on different parts of the research process. These parts include investigating

video-art production, the history of YouTube and youth usage of YouTube. One strategy used in

this project is visualizing.

“The strategy consisted of using a box as a visual map of concepts and their connections.

The students attach to one side of the box words-concepts about their individual research

process…This process prompted them to speculate on conceptual connections, such as

those between YouTube and culture, between video and research, etc.” (Letsiou, 2016,

p.251)
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Image 2

Letsiou (2016) also used traditional forms of art making in her project like drawing and painting;

a drawing was made to, “represent the metaphor of video production as a mode of both

production and consumption. In addition, a mind map of a tree was created to represent the

connections among several components of the concept of culture.” (p. 251) Ultimately with this

project Letsiou (2016) wanted students to realize that inquiry and creativity were things that have

always been useful parts of their lives. (p. 252) In both projects art practice is knowledge

construction and research processes are the experiences that promote learning.

Experential Learning, Improvisation, and Art as Research

In “Experiential knowledge ad improvisation: Variations on movement, motion,

emotion” Douglas and Coessens (2011) analyze how artists who utilize improvisation compare

with those who use it in other fields; improvisation is a method utilizing experiential knowledge.

“Improvisation is a way of knowing that is experiential, pivotal to the body’s movement

and growth in the world…by focusing on practitioners who work with improvisation in

precise ways in the fields of anthropology, ecology, visual art and music, we explore how

improvisation and experiential knowledge are profoundly interconnected.” (p. 179)

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Here the cycle of experiential learning is used in that the artists in practice are having a concrete

experience in researching and observing their subject whether it be science art, practicing

reflective observation by creating art or reports from the information and knowledge gathered

from the previous step, bringing that knowledge into abstract conceptualization by creating their

art pieces, and taking part in active experimentation via the scientific process or via art making,

or even both in the case of two artists studied in this article. This article addresses multiple artists

who use improvisation as an educative experience in their work. Two that are examples of this

are Helen Meyer and Newton Harrison, “ecology artists and systems thinkers” (Coessens &

Douglas, 2011, p.181) who “examine the ecoculture of specific places under threat. In response,

they create work that traces the interconnectedness of living systems.” (Coessens & Douglas,

2011, p. 181) Just as in Letsiou’s (2016) classroom projects, this team of artists use research on a

topic as a part of their art making which is experiential and helping to develop theirs and others’

knowledge on the subjects. Douglas and Coessens (2011) use Dewey’s ideas to explain why art

making is experiential learning in these contexts,

“According to Dewey, our primary approach to the world is immediate, prenoetic,

embodied, vague and undefined. Dewey calls this the level of ‘feelings’, making possible

a first discernment of the world as loved, intuitive. On the next level of ‘sense’, the world

is accepted and reflected upon as meaningful. Third, these experiences are articulated

through signs and symbols, through ‘signification’ As such, ‘Experience is as much

cognitive as sensory.’… Making a spot is generative, determining a beginning

represented by a point in space. It is an intervention, a breaking of chaos, simultaneously

an improvisational and organizational action” (p. 184)

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Here we see how art making itself is an experiential learning process. Through using mark-

making as described by Dewey in art as research teachers can integrate art as experiential

learning into all different subjects.

Research Gaps and Emerging Questions

While both texts very comprehensively address experiential learning in the topics at

hand, and one cannot identify any significant research gaps, there are some unanswered

questions in both. In Letsiou’s (2016) article, the author acknowledges that she is still in process

of teaching these courses when this article was written so we cannot know the ultimate affect her

approach had on her students, she can only speculate. In Douglas and Coessens’(2011) article

implications of improvisation in experiential learning is not addressed for other uses such as

education, this link can only be inferred by readers.

Implications for Educators

As future and current art educators, we can learn from these articles and apply

experiential learning by using art as research. Asking our students to actually engage personally

with the subjects at hand and to really reflect on their thoughts and conclusions. Researching

experiential learning theory has given me as a future educator a whole new perspective on how

and why art making can and should be integrated into curriculum. Using art as research is a way

to apply experiential learning to formal situation such as teaching things in the classroom, like

Letsiou (2016) did with her classes, as well as informal situations such as outside of the

classroom as Douglas and Coessens (2011) do in their research and ecologically conscious art

making.
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References

Aubrey, K. & Riley, A. (2016). Understanding and using educational theories. Thousand Oaks,

CA: Sage.

DOUGLAS, A. a., & COESSENS, K. k. (2012). Experiential knowledge and improvisation: Variations

on movement, motion, emotion. Art, Design & Communication In Higher Education, 10(2),

179-198.

Letsiou, M. (2016). Art as research: Defending the significance of art practice in high school.

International Journal Of Education Through Art, 12(3), 241-255.