This course represents the experiential phase of the Kolb learning cycle. Students document working 800 paid hours in the hospitality industry and write a report that assesses the quality of the employer’s application of the hospitality principles.

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Course Goal

Students will understand how hospitality concepts are applied in a real life environment and assess the quality of the application of the hospitality concepts.

Course Objectives

The student should be preparing for a hospitality career through actual work experience, which is considered critical for managerial positions in the industry. The student should be able to assess the employer’s ability to apply hospitality concepts studied in the hospitality curriculum.

Course Grading

Pass/Fail--Upon submitting pay stubs for 800 paid hours and the 5-page report on the employer’s ability to apply hospitality concepts.

Course Assignments

Part 1: Course Final Paper

Students write a five-page paper about their work experience. In the paper, students evaluate their work experience from three viewpoints: 1) the work practices of their employer against hospitality management concepts learned in class; 2) the domains experienced by students in their work environment according to Bloom’s Taxonomy; and, 3) the level of learning achieved by students in the work environment according to Kolb’s Learning cycle; (see below). Students should discuss good and bad practices in their work environment. Students should also discuss how they would change the bad practices. Submit the paper to Canvas by the final day of the course.

Your paper should contain the following three sections:

Section 1:

Work Experience

• Introduction (Company name, student position, when employed, etc.)
• Ownership and organizational structure
• Description of student tasks/duties
• Evaluation of organization effectiveness
• Describe what the organization did well.
• Describe what the organization could do better and how.

Section 2:

Bloom’s Taxonomy application

• Choose a task that matches each behavior description and describe how the corresponding level was achieved.
• Describe why or why not the Evaluation level was achieved for the tasks in part A.

Section 3:

Kolb’s Learning Cycle

• Identify and describe your learning style
• Choose one task from your work experience and describe how you moved through the learning cycle.

Part 2: 800 Hours Verification

The hours documentation is typically accomplished by submitting a year-to-date paystub that indicates the total hours worked at a specific employer. If you do not have a year-to-date paystub from all appropriate employers, speak to the instructor about alternative means of documenting hours worked. Please make clear photocopies of all paycheck stubs. If the total hours worked has not been summarized by your employer (e.g., "Total hours = 825"), then please create a table in Word or Excel and sum up the hours from the various employers. The hours worked documentation should also be submitted to Canvas by the final day of the course. For more information on the 800-hours verification, go the the "Assignments" menu in Canvas.

Bloom's taxonomy learning domains - detailed structures

1. Bloom's taxonomy - cognitive domain - (intellect - knowledge - 'think')

Bloom's Taxonomy 1956 Cognitive Domain is as follows. An adjusted model was produced by Anderson and Krathwhol in 2001 in which the levels five and six (synthesis and evaluation) were inverted (reference: Anderson & Krathwohl, A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, 2001). This is why you will see different versions of this Cognitive Domain model. Debate continues as to the order of levels five and six, which is interesting given that Bloom's Taxonomy states that the levels must be mastered in order.

In my humble opinion it's possible to argue either case (Synthesis then Evaluation, or vice-versa) depending on the circumstances and the precise criteria stated or represented in the levels concerned, plus the extent of 'creative thinking' and 'strategic authority' attributed to or expected at the 'Synthesis' level. In short - pick the order which suits your situation. (.)

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Kolb learning styles

David Kolb's learning styles model and experiential learning theory (ELT)

Having developed the model over many years prior, David Kolb published his learning styles model in 1984. The model gave rise to related terms such as Kolb's experiential learning theory (ELT), and Kolb's learning styles inventory (LSI). In his publications - notably his 1984 book 'Experiential Learning: Experience As The Source Of Learning And Development' Kolb acknowledges the early work on experiential learning by others in the 1900's, including Rogers, Jung, and Piaget. In turn, Kolb's learning styles model and experiential learning theory are today acknowledged by academics, teachers, managers and trainers as truly seminal works; fundamental concepts towards our understanding and explaining human learning behavior, and towards helping others to learn. See also , which assist in understanding and using Kolb's learning styles concepts.

In addition to personal business interests (Kolb is founder and chairman of ), David Kolb is still (at the time I write this, 2005) Professor of Organizational Development at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, where he teaches and researches in the fields of learning and development, adult development, experiential learning, learning style, and notably 'learning focused institutional development in higher education'.

Kolb's experiential learning theory (learning styles) model

Kolb's learning theory sets out four distinct learning styles (or preferences), which are based on a four-stage learning cycle. (which might also be interpreted as a 'training cycle'). In this respect Kolb's model is particularly elegant, since it offers both a way to understand individual people's different learning styles, and also an explanation of a cycle of experiential learning that applies to us all.

Kolb includes this 'cycle of learning' as a central principle his experiential learning theory, typically expressed as four-stage cycle of learning, in which 'immediate or concrete experiences' provide a basis for 'observations and reflections'. These 'observations and reflections' are assimilated and distilled into 'abstract concepts' producing new implications for action which can be 'actively tested' in turn creating new experiences.

Kolb says that ideally (and by inference not always) this process represents a learning cycle or spiral where the learner 'touches all the bases', ie., a cycle of experiencing, reflecting, thinking, and acting. Immediate or concrete experiences lead to observations and reflections. These reflections are then assimilated (absorbed and translated) into abstract concepts with implications for action, which the person can actively test and experiment with, which in turn enable the creation of new experiences.

Kolb's model therefore works on two levels - a four-stage cycle:

Concrete Experience - (CE)

Reflective Observation - (RO)

Abstract Conceptualization - (AC)

Active Experimentation - (AE)

and a four-type definition of learning styles, (each representing the combination of two preferred styles, rather like a two-by-two matrix of the four-stage cycle styles, as illustrated below), for which Kolb used the terms:

Diverging (CE/RO)

Assimilating (AC/RO)

Converging (AC/AE)

Accommodating (CE/AE)

Diagrams of Kolb's learning styles

Here is a new improved (May 2006) . (Also as a pdfLinks to an external site..)

Kolb diagrams also in colour (like the image below): , and .

(Kolb diagrams updated May 2006)

Late work will not be accepted - - please pay close attention to the calendar.

Course Credits 1

Course Prerequisites              Major core completed

Miscellaneous course policies.  For policies regarding incomplete or withdrawal, please refer to the current university catalog and the annual academic calendar.