Experiential Learning - What & Why

The residential estate of Jalan Kukoh (also known as Chin Swee Road) piqued our interest due to a recent blog post by Rice Media that went viral, which highlighted that Jalan Kukoh, though situated in between Clarke Quay, Chinatown and Outram Park, is actually one of the poorest neighbourhoods in Singapore (Tustain, 2019). The post reflects the serious real world issue of rising income inequality in Singapore.

Despite having engaged in Experiential Learning before, it is the first time I've actually came across this term, and am truly internalising and actively trying to apply it as well.

Definition of Experiential Learning

Experiential learning involves a direct encounter with the phenomena being studied rather than merely thinking about the encounter, or only considering the possibility of doing something about it (Borzak, 1981).

By applying Kolb's Experiential Learning Model (Kolb, 1984) specifically to this learning journey, experiential learning would entail Concrete Experience of observing and interacting with the residents of Jalan Kukoh, followed by Reflective Observation of this experience (Kolb, 1984). Following which I would need to do an Abstract Conceptualisation of my experience in Jalan Kukoh to inequality in Singapore, and finally engage in Active Experimentation of applying what I have learnt (Kolb, 1984).

Reasons for Experiential Learning

Learning is found to be most effective when grounded in experience (Train & Elkin, 2001). Furthermore, for real learning to occur at deeper levels, education needs to be grounded in experience that is accompanied by the students' active reflection (Dewey, 1938).

As someone who comes from a rather privileged background, money has never caused any significant problems or hindered me from pursuing anything. I live in a four-room HDB flat in Pasir Ris, a considerably new neighbourhood, and my flat happens to be right next to the police station, which could reinforce the safety of the area in which I live in. Though I do know about the existence of rental housing, I have never actually seen any, or the type of estates that they are encompassed in.

View of Robertson Quay from Jalan Kukoh

As such, we decided to embark on a learning journey to Jalan Kukoh, to experience first-hand the neighbourhood in which the residents live in, to better understand in comparison to the rest of Singapore.

We also decided we would want to start our learning journey from Tiong Bahru, which is a 25 minute walk away from Jalan Kukoh. In recent years, Tiong Bahru has seen a surge of new condominiums and HDB flats being built, we wanted to compare the differences between two housing estates which are reasonably close together.

The benefits of this learning journey is supported by research showing that short-term experiential assignments such as observations and field trips, mitigate the drawbacks of long-term ones but still allows one to reap the benefits of an experiential assignments (Wright, 2000).

I also did more reading up on Jalan Kukoh and Chin Swee Road before we embarked on our learning journey and found out that it has a relatively high crime rate compared to other areas. The news largely revolved around volunteers helping the needy (Zainal, 2018), drug busts (Choo, 2019) and murders (Tan, 2019).

This knowledge of high crime rates made me question the general safety and security of the neighbourhood of Jalan Kukoh. Is this considered normal in Jalan Kukoh? Is this really a good place for children to grow up in? How does income inequality threaten the physical safety of the residents of Jalan Kukoh?

Through my experiential learning journey at Jalan Kukoh, I hope to see things from a different perspective and not just my privileged lenses, to notice the little things in the neighbourhood that might be different from others, and hopefully, the bigger picture of how it links to rising income inequality in Singapore.


(631 Words)

References:

Borzak, L. (1981). Field study: a sourcebook for experiential learning. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.

Choo, Y. T. (2019). $179,000 worth of drugs seized, 7 suspects arrested: CNB. The Straits Times. Retrieved from https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/courts-crime/179000-worth-of-drugs-seized-7-suspects-arrested-cnb

Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York, NY: Touchstone.

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

Tan, T. (2019). Family in Chin Swee Road murder case is known to community agencies: MSF. The Straits Times. Retrieved from https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/family-in-chin-swee-road-murder-case-is-known-to-community-agencies-msf

Train, B., & Elkin, J. (2001). Branching Out. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science, 33(2), 68–74. doi: 10.1177/096100060103300203

Tustain, B. (2019). I Live in Jalan Kukoh, One of the Poorest Neighbourhoods in Singapore. This is My Story. Retrieved from https://www.ricemedia.co/culture-people-jalan-kukoh-poorest-neighbourhoods-singapore/.

Wright, M. C. (2000). Getting More out of Less: The Benefits of Short-Term Experiential Learning in Undergraduate Sociology Courses. Teaching Sociology, 28(2), 116. doi: 10.2307/1319259

Zainal, N. S. (2018). Giving a voice to others. The Straits Times. Retrieved from https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/giving-a-voice-to-others