Over the Edge: Can Holistic Education Contribute to Experiential Education?

Abstract

This article compares and contrasts experiential and holistic education and suggests some points of entry where basic principles of holistic education could serve to enhance the conceptual foundations of the philosophy of experiential education. The article begins by comparing three curriculum orientations: transmission (back-to-basics education), transaction (progressive and experiential education), and transformation (holistic education). The paper then assesses the definition of experiential education put forward in three recent contributions to the Journal. It is suggested that these definitions could well be enriched by privileging forms of consciousness beyond the cognitive, by deepening the notion of relationship to include embeddedness, and by honouring the “state of being” alongside “acts of doing.”