Experiential
Exercise
A short, memorable experience helps
students grasp social studies concepts.
What is an Experiential Exercise?
• It is the use of movement and then the
examination of students’ own thoughts and
conduct, in order to capture a moment or
feeling that is central to understanding a
particular concept or historical event.
Connections between concepts & events
• Too often in the conventional classroom, students don’t learn social
studies, they memorize it. History, geography, economics, and civics
are often presented— by teacher and textbook alike—as a series of
names, dates, and facts.
• Some students are adept at memorizing these; most are not. But
even students who memorize well generally do not retain the
information longer that it takes to regurgitate it on a test. Fewer still
are able to demonstrate real understanding of, or appreciation for,
the effect that various concepts and events have—or have had—on
their own lives.
• Lost are the rich human dramas, the compelling experiences of the
individuals who have shaped our history and our political and
economic realities, and the connections between concepts and
events.
• Experiential Exercises ensure that students grasp and remember
even the highest-level concepts.
Examples please…
• To help students understand the strengths and weakness of the
Roman Empire, for example, you might arrange students in a large
donut-like shape (the empire surrounding the Mediterranean),
variously assigning them roles as Romans, Provincials, or
Barbarians. “Roman” Experiential Exercise 47 armies gather wealth
from the far-flung provinces, but also encounter the difficulty of
defending the empire from barbarian invasions.
• Or, to understand the lifestyle of medieval monks, students might
take “vows” of poverty, obedience, and silence—and proceed
through the entire activity while trying to honor those vows.
• To understand the factors that drive modern-day Mexicans to
migrate to the United States, students might take on the roles of
central Mexican villagers, sharing their views about emigration
during a typical evening stroll in the village plaza.
• Students react to each experience as if it were real life, gaining an
appreciation of key concepts that they will remember for a long time.
Give me an example
• The Fear and Paranoia of McCarthyism
• Students experience the fear of communism and
the paranoia that fueled McCarthyism through a
game of “Fear of Dots.”
• Students are given a slip of paper that is either
blank or contains a dot, and keep their
designation secret as they move about the room
trying to form a “dot-free” group while relying on
questioning and suspicion.
Benefits?
• Taps into students’ intrapersonal
and body-kinesthetic intelligences
• Allows students to “experience” key
concepts firsthand
• Makes abstract ideas or remote events
meaningful
• Provides an appreciation for the event
which lasts longer than memorizing
names, dates, and facts
Step 1
Create a short, memorable
experience to help students
grasp a social studies concept.
When?
• When you can easily recreate a key event or
concept
– Re-creating World War I trench warfare may seem
daunting, but it takes just 10 minutes to transform your
room into a simulated battlefield.
– The result will be rich, experiential learning with economy
of time and energy.
• When the topic can be absorbed through a
physical or emotional experience
– The tedium, physical strain, and dehumanizing nature of
assembly-line work, for example, cannot be communicated
adequately through readings or images
– Students must feel its physical and emotional effects.
– They will literally have a “muscle memory” of some of the
advantages and disadvantages of assembly-line work.
• Use them when you want to evoke an
emotional response so that students react
empathetically to concepts they might
otherwise find remote or unimportant.
– For example, today’s students have a difficult time
understanding the devastation of people who lost their
savings when the banks failed during the Great Depression.
– They become much more empathetic after an activity in
which they experience something like the pain of a failing
economy themselves.
– To set up the experience, you would first give a quiz on
which students earn points important for their grade. The
next day, you tell them regretfully that half of their quizzes
were “lost”—misplaced, inadvertently thrown away, or
stolen.
• Use them when you want to emphasize
how a historical occurrence affected
the way people felt or reacted.
• For students to understand the behavior of people in history,
for example, they must appreciate the conditions that shape
people’s responses.
• Experiential Exercises can replicate the conditions of a time or
place so that students respond in ways similar to those of
individuals in the real life situation.
• To help students understand McCarthyism, you give each
student a slip of paper, either blank (good) or containing a dot
(bad). Students keep their designation secret as they move
about the room, trying to form a large “dot-free” group while
relying only on questioning and suspicion. Afterward, carefully
sequence questions to help students draw parallels between
the “fear of dots” and the resulting classroom behavior, and
the fear of communism and the rise of McCarthyism.
Step 2
Prepare your
students for a safe,
successful
experience.
How?
•
•
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Make sure it is age appropriate
Prepare administration and families
Arrange the classroom ahead of time
Communicate clear expectations
Anticipate reactions and be prepared with
a response
• Recognize teachable moments
Step 3
Make the experience as
authentic as possible
How?
• Assume the proper persona (you too are
acting)
• Ham it up- use simple props, costumes,
music, and sound effects.
Step 4
Allow students to express their
feelings immediately after the
experience.
Why?
• Students need to identify and articulate
their feelings to process the situation
• Students need to realize their reactions
are acceptable and based in historical
context
Step 5
Ask carefully sequenced questions
to help make connections
between students’ experiences
and key concepts or events.
Why?
• Students had not previously been
introduced to the concept, so the
connection between the situation and
reality must be spelled out in carefully
sequenced spiraling questions in order to
fully comprehend the experience and draw
their own conclusions
Debriefing Questions
• What feelings did you experience during this activity?
• Describe the kind of work you did on the assembly line.
• What made assembly-line work difficult? What made it desirable?
• How did you cope with the repetition?
• How do you feel about the product you were making?
• How do you think turn-of-the-century assembly-line workers felt about
their jobs?
• Why do you think factory owners used the assembly line as a method
of production?
• What are the positive aspects of mass production? the negative
aspects?
• In what ways do you think this activity was similar to real assembly
lines?
• In what ways do you think this activity was different from real assembly
lines?
Don’t underestimate the complexities
• Notice that the last two questions ask students to compare
how the experience was both like and unlike reality. As
students explore how Experiential Exercises compare to real
life, they begin to see the differences in magnitude, scope,
and seriousness between the classroom activity and historical
reality.
• Failing to confront these differences after the assembly-line
activity would trivialize the experience of workers during the
Industrial Revolution. And neglecting to make comparisons to
real life after an Experiential Exercises runs the risk that
students will underestimate the complexities of the concept or
event they are exploring.
EE Tips
• Prepare students for a safe, successful experience by
arranging the classroom appropriately, communicating
clear behavioral and learning expectations, anticipating
student reactions, and recognizing teachable moments.
• Bring authenticity to the experience by assuming an
appropriate persona, hamming it up, and using simple
props, costumes, music, and sound effects.
• Allow students to express their feelings immediately after
the experience.
• Ask carefully sequenced questions to help students make
connections between their experiences and key
concepts or events.