Kolb's learning cycle for professional development of employees

Kolb's Experiential Learning Cycle (ELC)

Kolb suggests his learning cycle for effective learning, and individuals should undergo all four stages of the educational cycle as shown in Fig. 1(Kolb, 1974). The learner can enter the cycle at any stage( Kolb and Boyatwzis, 1999). Kolb's ELC provides the chance to complete activities for every learning vogue, matching an individual's learning vogue preferences (McLeod, 2010).

                                                                                                                    Fig.01

The four stages are,

 1.Concrete experience: In the initial stage of the cycle, an individual come across  a new experience. This could be planned or accidental.

2. Reflective observation: In the second stage, the individual reviews on the experience prior to make any judgements.  

3.Abstract conceptualization: In abstract conceptualization, the person implements theories and new ideas based on the experience.

 4.Active experimentation: Finally , people apply what they learned within the experiences to different scenarios. They use their theories to resolve issues, create choices and influence events. 

Kolb's learning styles

Kolb's learning vogue is explained in two dimensions:  An individual understands and processes the knowledge. 

1.Diverging: People of this type of learning vogue consider things from a completely different perspective. They like to look and study, conjointly they need imagination capability, emotional, sturdy in arts, like better to add teams, open-minded to require feedback and they have a broad interest in several cultures and other people.

2.Assimilating: People of this type of learning vogues like smart clear information and they'll logically format the given information and explore analytic models. They're fascinated by ideas and abstracts.

3.Converging: This style of learners solve issues. They apply their learning to sensible problems. Also, they like technical tasks, and that they experiment with new ideas. they have an inclination to be unemotional.

4.Accommodating: People with this type of learning vogue like better to understand things much. They're interested in new challenges and solve issues intuitively. 

Global context

Kolb's ELC is usually used to analyze variations within the learning of numerous schools or employee teams globally. Most of the professional development programs carried out in worldwide organizations to respond to the whims of technology and the increased technology. Applications of Kolb's ELC to enhance employee learning are sometimes mentioned within the context of the field of studies or coaching that need many weeks to complete (Clark et al., 2010, Raschick et al., 1998). Kolb's ELC is similar to alternative active learning approaches (Kolb, 2014) for comparison of active learning approaches. Among the active learning approaches, Lab-centric Instruction (Titterton, Lewis, & Clancy, 2010) and method homeward target-hunting Inquiry Learning (POGIL) used in computer learning is closely associated with Kolb's ELC. Organizations review the ideas developed by David Kolb and initiate new ideas in learning sessions in three ways:

1) Facilitate to focus on a lot of specific learning sessions for individuals, we tend to operate with.

2) Facilitate coaching and training exercises that meet up with the particular approach.

3) Facilitate to change any learning intervention for individuals in line with the four stages.

One way to realize the impact of practising this theory is through ready-made eLearning content and custom-made e-learning. Each caters to various needs and learning designs. As an example, most ready-made content is created from short, sharp one to five-minute sessions whereas custom-made e-learning content will gives mixed answer online solutions or as online coaching with presenter, animation or motion graphic content to cater different preferences. The studies revealed it is a more effective rather than a ready-made approach (Konak, Clark and Nasereddin, 2014).

 

Advantages

• Each stage of the model is related to a special most well-liked learning vogue. This ensures that each one most well-liked learning designs area unit used as you step through the model.
• The model provides a mixture of ancient teaching and active learning.
• The model forces the teacher to use a lot of tools than merely broadcasting their data to the scholar.

Disadvantages

• The totally different learning designs are beneficial, and it is often troublesome for a trainer to accommodate a variety of learning techniques during a cluster state of affairs.
• It isn't an invariably obvious way to apply the model within the world. The teacher isn't any longer broadcasting their data, and they have to understand their students already to tailor the coaching to them.
• The continuous cycle approach to learning might not be ideal if you wish to require associate communication for some purpose.

Conclusion

Kolb’s learning cycle consists of four stages of action that have to be compelled to happen for effective learning with feeling, observing, thinking, and doing. The model additionally describes totally different learning designs, acknowledging that as distinctive people, individuals preferred learning in several ways. The most effective organizations invest within the coaching and development of their workers. A number of these coaching can happen through courses and accreditations and the usual approach we train individuals may be to transmit data to them via a presentation. The experiential learning cycle allows to consider new ideas, place method of continuous analysis and reflection resulting in enhancements and improves the professional development of employees(London and Manual, 2011).

References

Baker, Kolb, D. A., Jensen, J. (2002) Conversational Learning: An Experiential Approach to Knowledge and Creation. Westport: Quorum.

Kolb, D. A. (1984) Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.

Kolb, D. A. (2014) Experiential Learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education. 

Kolb, D. A. and Boyatwzis (1999) Experiential Learning Theory: Previous research and new directions. Cleveland: Case Western Reserve University.

Konak, A., Clark, T., Nasereddin, M. (2014) 'Using Kolb's Experiential Learning Cycle to improve student learning in virtual computer laboratories', Computers and education, Elsevier. 22. pp 11-22. Available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2013.10.013

London, Manual, (2011) The Oxford Handbook Of Lifelong Learning. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

McLeod, J. (2010) 'The effectiveness of workplace counselling: A systemic review', Counselling and Psychotherapy Research, 10, pp.238-248.

Titterton, N., Lewis, C. M., Clancy, M. J. (2010) 'Experience with lab centric instruction', Computer Science Education, 20, pp 79-102.