Experiential Learning Environments for Business Education

This entry is taken from the first half of a paper I wrote for my master's work in the Technology, Innovation, and Education program at Harvard's Graduate School of Education.  With guidance from my advisor on this project, David Kahle, I researched experiential learning theory and developed the beginnings of a design framework for experiential learning environments.  I then applied the design framework to an experiential learning platform being developed by our new product development team at Harvard Business School Publishing.  This first half provides an overview of experiential learning and that is the focus of this entry.  I'll review the design vision and principles as well as our product plans in a future entry.

Introduction

This paper is being written by an employee of Harvard Business School Publishing who works on educational technology products, and for a course in the Technology, Innovation, and Education master’s program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.  As such, the conceptual process is to bring educational research and perspectives to bear to enlighten and inform the development of educational products which will be distributed to the higher education marketplace.  It will seek to balance commercial, academic, and research motivations.  In some cases I will use the term “we” to refer to the HBS Publishing team dedicated to developing new products, but any errors or issues with the content of this paper are the sole responsibility of the author.

Harvard Business School has a long history of utilizing the “Case Method” of teaching – a discussion-based pedagogical format in which the teacher becomes the facilitator who guides students through a learning experience largely comprised of the students’ own thoughts and discussions.  This is a form of experiential learning, and as instructional technologists at this institution we strive to endow those same learning principles to additional learning environments beyond classroom-based discussion.  Those learning environments might include team activities; they might include student role-plays or negotiation exercises; or they might include online simulations. 

The mission of the school is “to educate leaders who make a difference in the world,” and the mission of our publishing arm is “to improve the practice of management and its impact in a changing world.”  We believe that experiential learning is a critical piece of educating leaders and improving management practices.  At HBS Publishing, our business of producing and distributing high-quality products for the higher education market is quickly evolving into how to frame those products in an environment that is conducive to high-quality, effective learning.  In short, we consider experiential learning environments as both product and delivery platforms to be a critical part of our value proposition.

The goal of this paper is to offer a design framework (based on a vision and design principles) for how these experiential learning environments are best designed, constructed, and maintained.  Many design frameworks exist and some are detailed here.  But the ultimate goal is to focus on that framework recipe that focuses on business education and delivers an experiential learning experience for the user.

This paper will begin by examining the pedagogy of experiential education.  In order to create a vision and framework we first need to understand the context, so experiential learning will first be defined and examined in the context of various related theories of learning– not as an exhaustive research review but to provide boundaries around the definition as utilized in this paper.  Examples will then be given within the context of business education.  Next some research on the efficacy of this pedagogical model will be reviewed. 

Then, after being comfortable with the definition, theory, examples, and justification, we will be at the point where an informed vision can be defined – an ideal case on which to derive principles based on that vision. These principles represent the critical characteristics necessary to fulfill the vision, but also illustrate the trade-offs necessary to consider when creating any learning environment.  These principles then form the foundation for a design framework that can inform how we can best design, use, and maintain such frameworks.  The framework is then applied to a sample product/platform to allow theory to be assessed on a tangible level.

Experiential Learning

What is Experiential Learning?

Experiential learning is most often defined in contrast to what it is not – didactic or lecture-based education which is seen to be fundamentally passive, one-way, teacher-to-student education.  By contrast, experiential education focuses on the students’ application of the knowledge as an integral part of their ability to both internalize concepts and apply the knowledge to real-world settings.

We’ll review some of the theories related to experiential learning in order to better define it.  The goal here is not to provide an exhaustive review but rather a sampling of these ideas to provide context for viewing experiential education as a model of learning.

Constructivist perspective on learning
At its highest levels, the idea of experiential education is a constructivist approach to learning in that it acknowledges that we constitute our own experiences and we are participants in our meaning-making. (Kegan, 1982)  Applied more directly to participative learning:

The constructivist view of education, stemming from the work of Piaget, Dewey, and Vygotsky, argues that the goal of education is to help students construct their own understandings. In contrast to the instructional-delivery view, the constructivist view leads to an emphasis on learning rather than teaching, and on facilitative environments rather than instructional goals. (Collins, 1996)

Epistemological models of learning
Hofer and Pintrich define epistemology as:

An area of philosophy concerned with the nature and justification of human knowledge.  Personal epistemological development and beliefs -- how individuals come to know, the theories and beliefs they hold about knowing, and the manner in which such epistemological premises are part of and an influence on the cognitive processes of thinking and reasoning. (B. K. Hofer & Pintrich, Spring 1997)

At its core the argument about the value and/or scope of what learners come to know is an epistemological one.  The authors recap several epistemological frameworks.  Perry’s scheme of intellectual and ethical development was descriptive of the nature of truth and knowledge.  One category called “Dualism” described a right/wrong view of the world, a world in which authorities are expected to know the truth and convey it to the learner.  That is the model that one would ascribe to the lecture learning model.  Contrast that to the work of Berenky et al:

The authors "advocate a model of teachers as 'participant-observers' who model and display their thinking processes in public dialogue, a classroom culture that accepts the voicing of uncertainty, standards of evaluation that are co-constructed by teachers and students, and classes in which knowledge is created not through conflict but consensus.”

Participant-centered learning
The discussion-based learning environment taken from the study of law and popularized in business education by Harvard Business School’s case-methodology is an example of the co-construction of the environment by learners and teachers.  Faculty in this model facilitate peer-to-peer learning through discussion of cases to simulate real-world problem solving.

As described by a faculty member proficient in this “case method” of teaching:

You can't acquire judgment and skill simply by reading books or listening to lectures any more than you can become a great swimmer just by reading a book on swimming.  While the knowledge obtained from books and lectures can be valuable, the real gains come from practice at analyzing real business situations.(Hammond, 2006)

One expert on the case methodology puts it this way: "In the lecture method, learners receive knowledge from an expert.  In the case method, learners make the knowledge with the assistance of an expert."(Ellet, 2007)

Situated learning
Lave and Wenger first posited that all learning is contextual, intrinsically connected to the contextual social and physical environment in which it occurs.  Brown, Collins, and Duguid then suggested that the breach between learning and use (“know what” and “know how”) is fostered by the very educational system that seeks to use one in preparation of the other. They argue that schools ignore the fact that the culture and context of practice feeds learning, and are blind to the fact that the culture of the school actually biases the very type of learning that can occur:

Just as carpenters and cabinet makers use chisels differently, so physicists and engineers use mathematical formulae differently. Activity, concept, and culture are interdependent. No one can be totally understood without the other two. Learning must involve all three. Teaching methods often try to impart abstracted concepts as fixed, well-defined, independent entities that can be explored in prototypical examples and textbook exercises. But such exemplification cannot provide the important insights into either the culture or the authentic activities of members of that culture that learners need. (Brown,John Seely, and Allan Collins and Paul Duguid, 1989)

By that definition they propose that authentic activity is important for learners to appropriate because that is the path by which practitioners act meaningfully and purposefully.  They suggest “cognitive apprenticeships” to help enculturate students into these authentic practices.  The principles of their ideal environment include collective wisdom, collective problem-solving, understanding and the multiple roles associated with tasks, confronting and discussing ineffective strategies, and working collaboratively – all hallmarks of an experiential learning approach to education.

Active learning
Numerous additional research exists that supports the idea of experiential learning as a pedagogical model for learning (literature on the efficacy of experiential learning will be reviewed later in this paper).  As one final example, the Education Resources Information Center described the importance of “Active Learning”:

Analysis of the research literature (Chickering and Gamson 1987), however, suggests that students must do more than just listen: They must read, write, discuss, or be engaged in solving problems. Most important, to be actively involved, students must engage in such higher-order thinking tasks as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Within this context, it is proposed that strategies promoting active learning be defined as instructional activities involving students in doing things and thinking about what they are doing. (Bonwell, Charles C., and James A. Eison, 1991)

Experiential Learning in Business Education

This is not meant to be an exhaustive list of possible experiential environments/mechanisms for business education, but merely a sampling.

Case studies
Case studies such as those used at Harvard Business School are excellent examples of basic experiential learning.  Instead of faculty merely lecturing on business principles to students, the students read an account of a protagonist (real, disguised, or fictional) who faces a management dilemma.  The cases often end in a ‘cliff hanger’ protagonist decision point. 

Students show up to class having read the case for homework, and the faculty member then facilitates a discussion-based classroom session where students posit optimal scenarios for the protagonist to take based on their conceptual analysis of the case material.  Part simulation and part role-play, cases afford students the opportunity to “wear the protagonists’ shoes” and in that sense “learn by doing” – practice the analysis, decision-making, and articulation of strategy just as if they faced the case dilemma themselves.

Role-play exercises
Role-play exercises (sometimes called ‘simulations’) would be another example of an experiential learning activity.  By adopting a perspective or character and acting out scenarios or actions or discussions, or defending or promoting a position, students are actively engaged in the learning process in a way that reading or listening alone might not entail.

For instance, the “RetailMax” negotiation case from Harvard Business School is described as follows:

Presents a three-way version of the RetailMax simulation requiring students to enact an internal salary negotiation, taking on the roles of Cam Archer, a star employee, and Regan Kessel, a VP trying to attract the MBA into his department. However, RetailSoft introduces a third party, Sydney Masser, to illustrate the effects of negotiating for self vs. others. (McGinn, Kathleen L., and Dina Witter, 2006)

The learning objectives are summarized as follows:

To entertain evaluating and developing BATNAs (best alternatives to negotiated agreement). Also, to illustrate tactics for claiming value and to introduce the use of decision trees for calculating reservation prices and the establishment of bargaining zones.

Presumably the concepts of BATNAs, reservation prices, and bargaining zones, and the tactics of claiming value and using decision trees could all be described for students via textbooks, lectures, or both.  But the role-play exercise affords an experiential element to students so that they experience, rather than just observe, the learning objectives.

MIT’s Lawrence Susskind describes how negotiation simulations work:

Negotiation training through simulation follows psychologist Kurt Lewin’s three-step change process.  The first step is to help a trainee unfreeze his current approach, usually by holding up a mirror and challenging ingrained assumptions. Next, trainers seek to assist participants in changing their underlying logic by imagining a more effective approach to the same task. Finally, through simulation, trainers help their students refreeze the new approach by trying it out in a safe setting where their performance will not be judged or recorded. (Susskind, 2005)

Team/group exercises
Team and group exercises, when organized to engage in activities that directly relate to learning, can be examples of experiential education. Here’s how an orientation note describes the “Subarctic Survival Situation” team exercise (originally developed by Human Synergistics, Inc.):

…an experiential exercise that gives students an opportunity to learn about their personal influence style and their effectiveness as a team leader or member. As a simulation, the exercise provides conditions analogous to those managers face every day: They must make critical decisions from incomplete and often ambiguous information and must live with imperfect solutions; the problem is urgent and they have to cope with the stresses and emotions associated with working under pressure; they will have to work with others to solve a common problem... (Hill, Linda A., and Katherine S. Weber, 1995)

As with the role-play example, personal influence style, team effectiveness, problem-solving under pressure – these concepts can all be taught using any variety of instructional methods.  But by experiencing it firsthand via this exercise, students have a rich, personal experience from which to draw conclusions and learning.

Management Games
In 1956 the American Management Association developed the "Top Management Decision Simulation" in an effort to bring the benefits of “war games” – long used by the military for both practice and predictive purposes – to the world of business, and specifically to their course on decision making.(Cohen, Kalman J., and Eric Rhenman, 1961) Other games followed, produced by both industry and academia.  The most famous of the early games was developed by G.R. Andlinger of McKinsey and Company. Here Andlinger describes the value proposition for his “Business Management Game” in terms that should by now sound familiar:

The grooming of executives for positions of increased responsibility has always presented a dilemma to business.  To qualify for any to level job, a man must have "sound business judgment," "breadth of vision," "ability to integrate parts of the business," and related skills.  Yet how is he able to acquire these qualities before he is in a top-level job?  Of course, books, training courses, rotation programs, and work on committees can give a man some exposure to the problems of making the transition from the operational to the judgmental level.  But the fact remains that only through experience can he develop real skill in making decisions at the top level.(Andlinger, 1958)

When corrected for gender and applied to all levels of the information workforce, this quote from his 1958 Harvard Business Review article on the value of business games still rings true today for those espousing experiential learning for business education. Even by the early 1960s this field of management gaming had exploded – there are dozens of scholarly articles in the field and even bibliographies created to keep track of the use of simulation and gaming in management analysis.(Malcolm, 1960)   

Early games often involved team play where players made decisions, those decisions were processed which produced an effect on the game environment or game resources, and then the players continued the cycle based on the newly-changed environment.  Sometimes processing was assisted during playtime by inputting decisions into a mainframe computer, but not always.

Management games continue to be used, although many have migrated partially or wholly to computer- and web-based products.  As games became more complex and involved more variables, and as computing power became stronger and cheaper, this progression was natural.  There are still active groups of business educators devoted to the use of experiential learning methods (including management games) for business education, including the Association for Business Simulation and Experiential Learning (ABSEL).

Proponents see the experiential nature of business management games as even preferential over cases.(Cohen, Kalman J., and Eric Rhenman, 1961)  Cases have two potential drawbacks: they seldom provide students to try a problem more than once (run scenarios), and they can only provide limited feedback during the class discussion on the direct decisions of any given student.  Management games, by their dynamic nature, can mitigate these issues.

Simulations
Many management games actually did have simulation components, and even role-play negotiation exercises and some team-based activities described above are often referred to as simulations.  There is little standardization of this term within management education or even within the larger educational and research communities.  This definition of simulation may help frame the type and scope of “simulation” referred to in this paper:

Simulation involves building a dynamic model of a process or system, then performing what-if analysis to see how changes would affect the actual process. By mimicking its operation you can understand the system better, explore alternative strategies, optimize performance, and train personnel – all at a fraction of the cost and time it would take to experiment with the real system. (Aldrich, 2004)

Aldrich also quotes Jane Boston of Lucas Learning on the application of simulations.(Aldrich, 2005)  She claims simulations are best used for:

• Understanding big ideas & concepts
• Depicting time & scale
• Situations where it is important to give people practice in decision making (because in real life it is critical or dangerous)
• Taking us to a time/place we are unable or unlikely to experience directly

Aldrich categorizes four types of simulations (although simulations may contain several of these as ‘elements’): interactive spreadsheets, branching stories, game-based models, and virtual labs/products.

• Interactive spreadsheets-- These are the ‘number crunching’, business process, calculator-type simulations.  An example for business is the “Business Analysis and Valuation Model”:

Once you enter company financial statements, this software enables you to standardize them to a common format, make any needed adjustments to the company's accounting, and make assumptions about the company's future performance. The model then provides financial ratios for the company, with benchmarks for the U.S. economy, company pro forma financial statements, and a company valuation using several standard valuation techniques. (Healy, Paul, and Krishna Palepu and Jonathan Barnett, 2007)

• Branching stories -- These are usually static content “trees” – the user is presented with a “customized” content experience by directing them down different “branches” based on their prior multiple-choice and/or navigation decisions.  Many simulations for business actually follow this model, although we’ll argue in the principles and frameworks section that in their simplest and purest form these are not examples of experiential learning.
• Game-based models -- By this Aldrich means the “make learning fun” aspect of engagement and motivation.  There are also gaming products for business education that are not simulation-related.  Again, the principles and frameworks section will make explicit criteria for effective experiential learning environments.
• Virtual labs/products -- Here users interact visually with accurate representations of actual products or environments, unencumbered by the restrictions of reality. Aldrich distinguishes virtual labs from products in that the former forsakes some of the fidelity of the latter in order to focus on a situation where the product is used. This genre is used heavily for training and marketing purposes.

In many instances there are “business simulation games” today that combine management games and simulations, or rather use computing power to enhance the simulation aspects and playability of the traditional management game format.  And hence the value proposition attributed to simulations for learning closely mirrors that which we saw for management games.  Here’s an example of guidelines given in the facilitation guide of a popular simulation:

This simulation is designed to help you to begin to progress from an intellectual to an operational understanding of how to better manage service business. Intellectual understanding is knowing what to do.  We hope the case discussions and other supporting materials help in this arena.  With the simulation, we hope to help you develop a better "operational understanding" or knowing when and how much of it to do, and what indicators to keep in mind when making decisions. (Oliva, 2000)

Aldrich also has new perspectives on how to assess the value of learning through simulations and other immersive learning environments. (Aldrich, TBD) These ‘sweet spots’ or major constructs are as natural to simulations as internal monologues are to books:

• Situational Awareness – what do experts see when they come to a scene that others don’t?
• Understanding Actions – what do experts see as viable options, and trade-offs of each? How and when should one calibrate responses?
• Intuition / Pattern Recognition – How and why do things play out? What are small steps now that can have a big impact?
• Conceptual Dead Reckoning – understanding the opportunities, committing to a vision, and then navigating towards it.

It is beyond the scope of this paper to review the myriad formats of simulations available, but some formats blend team exercises with simulations to create truly experiential environments.  One such example is the PDA Participatory Simulations program run by MIT. Personal Digital Assistant devices (handheld computers) are used to “embed people inside of simulations.” .(Massachusetts Institute of Technology, ) This approach is indicative of the hybrid formats found in many of today’s experiential education environments.

Miscellaneous
There are obviously additional environments not being covered here – online courses with “experiential” elements; the “serious games” initiative and more general gaming-for-education environments; Second Life and other virtual world environments.  Some we might qualify as experiential in nature and others we might qualify as learning in purpose; it is the hope that the vision and principles section below will provide criteria for determining which qualify as experiential learning environments at least as they pertain to business education.

For more information on experiential learning environments for education (although not explicitly tied to business education), see the Computing Research Association’s 2005 Report: “Cyberinfrastructure for Education and Learning for the Future: A Vision and Research Agenda.”

Why Focus on Experiential Learning?

Changing paradigm of learners and learning
The nature of the higher education student has been changing for some time.  Diane Oblinger, Vice President of EDUCAUSE, writes that the National Center for Education Statistics lists over ¾ of all undergraduates as “non-traditional”, meaning they have one or more of the following characteristics: delayed enrollment to postsecondary education; attend school part-time; work full-time; are financially independent; have dependents; are single parents; lack a high school diploma.  These are the “milennials” born on or after 1982.  (Oblinger, 2003)

Oblinger also points out some other key characteristics of these students:

• They don’t consider computers to be “technology” – they have never known life without them.
• They gravitate toward group activity.
• Doing is more important than knowing – results and actions are seen as more important than the accumulation of facts.
• Learning is an experimental endeavor – in the trial-and-error world of video gaming, “losing” is the fastest method of mastering a challenge.
• Multi-tasking is a way of life for them.
• They have zero tolerance for delay.

She lists a major implication of this for the educational arena: students are looking for experiential, interactive, and authentic learning.

Building bridges from education to industry
Educators are also concerned about building effective bridges between students and the workplace.  The Education Information Resource Center writes:

…experiential learning is a necessary component of formal instruction in colleges and universities for several reasons. First, faculty are concerned with optimizing the chances for their students to more easily enter their chosen professions or meet their desired goals upon graduation from the college program due to decreasing job markets and increasing competition among college graduates across most all fields of study…(there is) mutual concern among teachers and employers about the effectiveness of preparing our future generations for the American workforce at all levels technical and professional. (Cantor, 1997)

Both students and educators are interested in the concept and practice of experiential education.  We should briefly examine research on the effectiveness of this learning model to make issues known prior to setting a vision and framework.

The Efficacy of Experiential Learning Environments

The pedagogy and the process
The Education Information Resource Center has summed up the challenges and history associated with this issue:

Although experiential education is really the oldest approach to learning, its practitioners have not had an easy time justifying its relevance in the educational world of the twentieth century. Experiential educators promote learning through participation, reflection, and application to situations of consequence. Although its practitioners are convinced of the effectiveness of this approach, skepticism persists outside the field. (Hendricks, 1994)

There have been many studies regarding the effectiveness of simulations and experiential learning.  Some would say that there is ample evidence to suggest a tie to learning and performance, whereas some would say that there have not been enough high-quality, standardized studies to warrant more than a tentative appreciation of efficacy.(Gosen, J., and J. Washbush, June 2004)  Not surprisingly, from the faculty perspective, users and former-users rate effectiveness much higher than do never-users. (Faria, A.J., and William J. Wellington, June 2004)

In 2001 Faria provided a history and complete list of references covering research on skills training through the use of business simulation games.  Across all of the reported studies, business simulation games were found to be more effective teaching tools, as measured by performance on course final exams, than conventional instructional methods (generally cases and lectures) in 75 of the research comparisons; conventional methods of instruction were found to be superior in 27 of the comparisons; and no differences were reported in 58 of the comparisons. (Faria, A.J., and William J. Wellington, June 2005)

In 2005 Faria and Wellington examined the conformity of business games to PIMS (Profit Impact of Marketing Strategies) findings. The PIMS program is a respected, multi-firm research project designed to gather and analyze marketing and financial data from a number of business firms.  Member companies submit annual data to the program, and the Strategic Planning Institute periodically issues findings framed as “laws of the marketplace” based on program analytics.  The researchers picked three laws and compared results in PIMS to results of two popular marketing strategy simulation games.  The results of over 700 simulated companies did conform to the laws of the real marketplace (“strong” in two cases and “moderate” in one), suggesting “once again that business gaming is a relevant and meaningful teaching tool.” (Faria, A.J., and William J. Wellington, June 2005)

Challenges to the effectiveness of business simulations and management games are not new.  In 1976 John Neuhauser, then Associate Professor but later Dean of the Carroll School of Management at Boston College, published his “Business Games Have Failed” article. In it he stated that the "aura of excitement" that sometimes surrounds gaming is the only thing universally agreed upon.  In a statement representative of the personal preference that dominates some of the more passionate writing at both ends of the spectrum on this issue, he determined “from personal experience and anecdotal evidence" that positive motivational feelings arising out of management games might also result "from a kind of 'halo' effect emanating from the environment surrounding evaluations” rather than being attributed to the games themselves. (Neuhauser, 1976)  He goes on to state his opinion of the origins of popularity in business gaming and simulation – that the growth in mainframe computing power led to an influx of computer specialists at universities, and these specialists propagated the use of activities that required significant computing power and expertise.

More reasonable challenges can, of course, also be found.  In the mid 1960s, Anthony Raia published a report that management games did produce a better understanding of basic concepts as well as increased motivation and interest in course lessons, but also challenged that they did not help the attainment of stated course objectives nor did they imbue a more favorable attitude in students toward the course. (Raia, 1966)

There are many calls for a localized examination of the effectiveness of any learning activity – namely, the call for assessment/evaluation.  Eisner (1993) presents a framework for evaluation, consisting of "eight criteria in search of practice" that are consistent with the premises of experiential education programs. (Hendricks, 1994) According to Eisner, evaluation tasks should:

1. Reflect real world needs, by increasing students' problem-solving abilities and ability to construe meaning;
2. Reveal how students solve problems, not just the final answer, since reasoning determines students' ability to transfer learning;
3. Reflect values of the intellectual community from which the tasks are derived, thus providing a context for learning and enhancing retention, meaning, and aesthetic appreciation;
4. Not be limited to solo performances, since much of life requires an ability to work in cooperation with others;
5. Allow more than one way to do things or more than one answer to a question, since real-life situations rarely have only one correct alternative;
6. Promote transference by presenting tasks that require students to intelligently adapt modifiable learning tools;
7. Require students to display an understanding of the whole, not just the parts; and
8. Allow students to choose a form of response with which they are comfortable.

The learner and the process
The effectiveness of learning models often focus on the products, the teachers, and the pedagogies associated with the learning environment.  But the students are obviously an integral part of the equation and the learning outcome, especially in experiential learning situations.

One critical facet of experiential learning outcomes is the realization that certain characteristics may need to be present in the learner to ensure success.  Grow describes a matrix of learning stages and teaching styles – certain combinations are effective while certain combinations are severe mismatches that will impede learning. (Grow, Spring 1991)  Obviously the goal is to try and map the teaching style to the learner stage. Teaching styles include the Authority/coach  Motivator/Guide  Facilitator  Consultant/Delegator, each one progressively more hands-off and indirect in format.  Learning stages include Dependent  Interested  Involved  Self-directed.  The early work of Malcolm Knowles also supports the idea that new developments in education put a heavy responsibility on the learners to take a good deal of initiative in their own learning. (Smith, 2005)

Depending on how the environment is structured, experiential learning requires higher-stage learners.  An epistemological framework developed by King and Kitchener called the Reflective Judgment Model focused on college students and produced three stages of judgment around students’ conception of the nature of knowledge: Pre-reflective (individuals unlikely to perceive that problems exist for which there may be no correct answer), Quasi-reflective (growing realization that one cannot know with certainty), and Reflective (knowledge is actively constructed and must be understood contextually; judgments are open to reevaluation).  Clearly Reflective learners are optimal for some of the experiential learning environments we have reviewed, but the authors claim that even college seniors are only just attaining the lowest levels of quasi-reflective thinking. (B. K. Hofer & Pintrich, 2002)

Kegan describes Orders of Mind that relate to stages of adult development.  He suggests that Third Order people are gradually beginning to become socialized and be cognizant of competing interests between themselves and their surroundings, but always with themselves as the main reference point. They look to authority structures as important only in relation to blind faith or disobedience for selfish reasons.  It is not until the Fourth Order that people become “self-authoring” and are able to negotiate their values against those of others.  Kegan argues that higher educational institutions expect students to be self-directed and that requires Fourth Order processing, and most higher education students have not yet achieved that level of development.  They are likely Third Order and hence the educational expectations and student capabilities are inherently mismatched. (Kegan, 1994) 

Clearly assessing and accommodating student capabilities and learning levels is critical for achieving the vision of experiential learning.

[A future entry will continue with the rest of the paper, which introduces preliminary design principles for experiential learning environments and applies them to an experiential learning platform product being designed by our new product development team at Harvard Business School Publishing.]

Bibliography:

Aldrich, C. (2004). Simulations and the future of learning : An innovative (and perhaps revolutionary)  approach to e-learning.San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

Aldrich, C. (2005). Learning by doing : A comprehensive guide to simulations, computer games, and pedagogy in e-learning and other educational experiences. San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

Aldrich, C. (TBD). The dictionary of post-literacy: A glossary for describing the world in the age of computer games and educational simulations. Unpublished manuscript.

Andlinger, G. R. (1958). Business games -- play one! Harvard Business Review, 36(2), 115.

Bonwell, Charles C., and James A. Eison. (1991). Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. Washington, D.C.: Educational Information Resource Center. From http://www.ericdigests.org/1992-4/active.htm

Brown, John Seely, and Allan Collins and Paul Duguid. (1989). Situated cognition and the culture of learning. [Electronic version]. Educational Researcher, 18(1), 32.

Cantor, J. A. (1997). Experiential learning in higher education: Linking classroom and community. Washington, D.C.: Education Information Resource Center.

Cohen, Kalman J., and Eric Rhenman. (1961). The role of management education games in education and research. Management Science, 7(2), 131.

Collins, A. (1996). Design issues for learning environments. In S. Vosniadou (Ed.), International perspectives on the design of technology-supported learning environments (pp. 396). Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Coval, J. (2007). The upTick financial markets simulation. Harvard Business School: personal communication.

Ellet, W. (2007). The case study handbook: How to read, discuss, and write persuasively about cases. Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press.

Emmons, Willis, and Regina Bento. (2007). HBS christensen center for teaching and learning. Harvard Business School: personal communication.

Faria, A.J., and William J. Wellington. (June 2004). A survey of simulation game users, former-users, and never-users. [Electronic version]. Simulation & Gaming, 35(2), 178-179-207.

Faria, A.J., and William J. Wellington. (June 2005). Validating business gaming: Business game conformity with PIMS findings. [Electronic version]. Simulation & Gaming, 36(2), 259-260-273.

Gosen, J., and J. Washbush. (June 2004). A review of scholarship on assessing experiential learning effectiveness. [Electronic version]. Simulation & Gaming, 35(2), 270-271-293.

Graetz, K. A. (2006). The psychology of learning environments. In D. Oblinger (Ed.), Learning spaces. Washington, D.C.: Educause. From http://www.educause.edu/learningspaces

Grow, G. (Spring 1991). Teaching learners to be self-directed. Adult Education Quarterly, 41(3), 125-126-149.

Hammond, J. S. (2006). Learning by the case method: A Harvard Business School note. Boston, Masschusetts: Harvard Business School Publishing.

Healy, Paul, and Krishna Palepu and Jonathan Barnett (2007). Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Publishing

Hendricks, B. (1994). Improving evaluation in experiential education. Washington, D.C.: Education Information Resource Center.

Hill, Linda A., and Katherine S. Weber. (1995). Orientation to the subarctic survival situationHarvard Business School Publishing.

Hofer, B. K., & Pintrich, P. R. (Spring 1997). The development of epistemological theories: Beliefs about knowledge and knowing and their relation to learning. [Electronic version]. Review of Educational Research, 67(1), 88-89-140.

Hofer, B. K., & Pintrich, P. R. (2002). Personal epistemology : The psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing. Mahwah, N.J.: L. Erlbaum Associates.

Kegan, R. (1982). The evolving self : Problem and process in human development. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

Kegan, R. (1994). In over our heads : The mental demands of modern life. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

Leonard-Barton, D., & Swap, W. C. (2005). Deep smarts: How to cultivate and transfer enduring business wisdom. Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press.

Malcolm, D. G. (1960). Bibliography on the use of simulation in management analysis. Operations Research,8 (2), 169. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. PDA participatory simulations. Retrieved 4/21, 2007, from http://education.mit.edu/pda/

McGinn, Kathleen L., and Dina Witter. (2006). RetailMax: Role for cam archer. Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Publishing.

Neuhauser, J. J. (1976). Business games have failed. The Academy Review, 1 (4), 124.

Oblinger, D. (2003, Boomers & gen-exers & millenials: Understanding the new students. [Electronic version]. EDUCAUSE Review, (July/August) 37.

Oliva, R. (2000). Learning from simulations: Guidelines for the building service, driving profit interactive simulation (class note). Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Publishing

Prevou, M. (2007). Experiential learning, personal communication.

Raia, A. P. (1966). A study of the educational value of management games. The Journal of Business, 39(3), 339.

Smith, M. K. (2005). Informal education. Retrieved 4/27, 2007, from http://www.infed.org/

Susskind, L. (2005). Full engagement: Learning the most from negotiation simulations. Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Publishing.

Wellington, W. J. (2007). Business simulations and education. University of Windsor: personal communication.

Comments

[Tommy Yu]

thanks, I found your blog very informative.

I have a few questions about business school teaching methods.

In the case studies, one can look at a case as if he was dealing with the real situation, then what is the difference between case studies and role-play?

Columba offers "master classs", they are classes that are cotaught by a Business School faculty member and a business practitioner, does this model belong to the role play exercises?

In Dean Glenn Hubbard's words" master class combines experiential learning with highly sophisticated, nuanced group work and increased contact with the business world." what's your view on this model?

Most of the MBA programs offer experiential learning
How does somebody choose one over another based on the teaching method?

Thank

[Denis]

Thanks Tommy. I think the basic difference between a case and a role play is that with a case, you READ ABOUT what somebody else did and then pause at a certain point (the end of the case) to consider what you MIGHT DO if you were in their shoes. Whereas in a role play you are given information about a person and then MAKE DECISIONS as if you were that person. One is conceptual, the other active. I can't speak for Columbia but here are some resources that will introduce you to Harvard Business School's brand of experiential learning, called Participant-Centered Learning:

http://harvardbusinessonline.hbsp.harvard.edu/hbsp/case_method.jsp