Facilitating learning: mine, yours and others' :gaining insight into the facilitation of corporate experiential learning programs through the lenses of personal experience and the learning styles analysis

Author

Tracey Dickson, University of WollongongFollow

Year

2003

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Department

Faculty of Education

Recommended Citation

Dickson, Tracey, Facilitating learning: mine, yours and others' :gaining insight into the facilitation of corporate experiential learning programs through the lenses of personal experience and the learning styles analysis, Doctor of Philosophy thesis, Faculty of Education, University of Wollongong, 2003. https://ro.uow.edu.au/theses/1778

Abstract

Writing and research on facilitation of experiential learning, including corporate programs, predominantly focuses upon what the facilitator is to do, with little or no consideration for where the facilitation occurs. Using a heuristic research process that involves an immersion in the dominant literature on experiential learning (with an emphasis upon North American literature), and through the use of the 'lenses' of personal experience and the use of the Teaming Styles Analysis, this thesis follows a journey of exploration into the world of experiential learning. The journey includes forays into deconstruction of a popular article on facilitation as well as exploring literature from other areas such as urban planning, human geography and organisational aesthetics. Other places 'visited' along the way includes surveys of the learning styles of 73 post graduate students as well as the professional practice of 76 facilitators of experiential learning from diverse countries and cultures. The destination at the commencement of the journey while unknown, had a motive to enhance the effectiveness of the facilitation of corporate experiential learning programs. However, by continuing to honour the role of personal experience, as supported by many feminist writers, and by being willing to reflect upon the writings and practice of facilitation of experiential learning, the final destination ended up being a place called Place and Space. Prior to arriving at the final destination, a creative synthesis of the journey is expressed through a weaving of a photo essay with the words of a poem. The final destination of this journey, Place and Space, begins to raise questions about what the impact of the physical environment, natural/wilderness or built, may have upon the individual and/or the group's learning experience. These questions form the beginnings for another journey.