Comments on: The Innerwick Experience: “A Space to Grow” http://edubuzz.org/blogs/donsblog/2008/08/08/the-innerwick-experience-a-space-to-grow/ "We learn from our experience.....if we reflect upon our experience" John Dewey Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:36:14 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7.1 hourly 1 By: Bill Stephen http://edubuzz.org/blogs/donsblog/2008/08/08/the-innerwick-experience-a-space-to-grow/comment-page-1/#comment-11347 Bill Stephen Wed, 20 Aug 2008 17:46:54 +0000 http://edubuzz.org/blogs/donsblog/?p=867#comment-11347 Great news to hear your positive comments on this learning journey that you and your colleagues recently embarked on at Innerwick Outdoor Education Centre. It was certainly an experience for both delegates and trainers but as you point out it was primarily the East Lothian management team commitment that made it a success. There are always tensions between the practical, memorable events like these and putting metaphors and analogy work into workplace practice. I think the pre-course,( i.e. design based on your group’s requirements) and post course work that your group engaged in is the key to success. Ongoing meetings and reflection back to the “aha” moments will also help with sustained transfer. I believe a stand alone “experience” is not enough in any Management/ Leadership Development course and this would need to be considered for any future courses to avoid “band-aid” short term solutions and ensure focused sustainable training. Introducing a stand alone course can be like as Randeree (2006) on training and development in education notes (All be it in relation to curriculum change and imposing new initiatives but I still like the analogy/metaphor!) this can be like; “Taking a bicycle wheel off a bike, adding a state-of-the- art car tyre and expecting the bike to now perform better without adjusting the bike or the rider” The real change may come from the day to day incidental, group, individual and team learning back in the workplace,(the keys to organisational learning) that can be triggered by the valued learning outcomes from your experiences and continued dialogue generated.(as opposed to just discussion!) Good luck. Great news to hear your positive comments on this learning journey that you and your colleagues recently embarked on at Innerwick Outdoor Education Centre. It was certainly an experience for both delegates and trainers but as you point out it was primarily the East Lothian management team commitment that made it a success.

There are always tensions between the practical, memorable events like these and putting metaphors and analogy work into workplace practice. I think the pre-course,( i.e. design based on your group’s requirements) and post course work that your group engaged in is the key to success. Ongoing meetings and reflection back to the “aha” moments will also help with sustained transfer.
I believe a stand alone “experience” is not enough in any Management/ Leadership Development course and this would need to be considered for any future courses to avoid “band-aid” short term solutions and ensure focused sustainable training. Introducing a stand alone course can be like as Randeree (2006) on training and development in education notes (All be it in relation to curriculum change and imposing new initiatives but I still like the analogy/metaphor!) this can be like;

“Taking a bicycle wheel off a bike, adding a state-of-the- art car tyre and expecting the bike to now perform better without adjusting the bike or the rider”

The real change may come from the day to day incidental, group, individual and team learning back in the workplace,(the keys to organisational learning) that can be triggered by the valued learning outcomes from your experiences and continued dialogue generated.(as opposed to just discussion!)

Good luck.

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