Learning = 3D-experience

The 3 experience-dimensions of learning

It takes some time to reflect on the analysis you admire, like I do with Knud Illeris' (em. Professor of Lifelong Learning, Denmark) book How We Learn. Like Johan Cruijff's: Je gaat het pas zien als je het doorhebt, which can be translated as You will only see it when you get it. The picture shows the 3D-experience as a key concept in learning.

Illeris provides a holistic understanding of what learning actually is and how and why learning and non-learning take place. Thereby answering a range of questions in relation to learning, such as learning and brain functions, self-perception, motivation, competence development, intelligence, learning style, learning in relation to gender, life age, teaching, school-based learning, net-based learning, workplace learning and educational politics.

He states: "The fundamental thesis of this book is that all learning involves these three dimensions, which must always be considered if an understanding or analysis of a learning situation is to be adequate."

1. content dimension is about what we learn, covering knowledge, understanding and skills. 
2. incentive dimension is about if we want to learn, covering motivation, emotion and volition.
3. interaction dimension is about the individual’s interaction with his/her social and material environment.

Illeris points out that all learning includes different processes: an interactive process between the individual and the environment, and internal mental acquisition and processing through which impulses from the interaction are integrated with the results of prior learning. While the premises for the interaction are historical and societal in nature, the acquisition process takes place on a basis that has been developed biologically in step with human development over millions of years.

Illeris (p 126): "The concept of experience I am setting out here does not, therefore, solely concern the notion that all three dimensions are involved, for they are all in principle always involved, but all three dimensions must also be of subjective significance for the learner in the context.

1.     Experience has important elements of content and knowledge, i.e. we acquire or understand something that we perceive to be important for ourselves.

2.     Experience also has a considerable incentive element, i.e. we are committed motivationally and emotionally to the learning taking place.

3.     Experience has an important social and societal element, i.e. we learn something that is not only of significance to us personally, but is something that also concerns the relationship between ourselves and the world we live in.

A very clear analytical structure, that shows that experiences to achieve learning should be three dimensional. It is very supportive theory for our simulation games (see https://learngames.nl/en/ ) in which these 3 dimensions of learning experiences are always present. So, the learning context to experience: You will only see it when you get it.