Walden's Inclusive Teaching and Learning Model
The Walden University Inclusive Teaching and Learning Model is a research-based conceptualization of exemplary educational andragogy that engages the adult learner in developing and building knowledge, skills, and attributes that will continue throughout life and support their growth and development as a reflective scholar-practitioner who affect positive social change.
University Exemplars
Walden's Inclusive Teaching and Learning Model
Undergraduate Policy Recommendations: Creating a Community of CareITL Learning Model
"I just work really hard to always be me. I don't have anything to prove - I don't feel as if I have to be smarter than or better than anyone. I stress that we are all learning every day together and I totally embrace the specialties and education my students bring."
Annie Morgan
MS Mental Health Counseling
Five Core Principles
The model commits Walden to these five core principles
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That all relationships within the university are person centered (Rogers, 1967; Landrine, 1992)—where both learner and facilitator engage in a relationship to increase self-awareness with respect to both the referential self (self at center) and indexical self (self within a social context) perspectives and to support positive regard for others and empathy—with the goal of enhancing mutual learning.
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That the focus of learning is rooted in experience and in the integration of knowledge and theory to create new opportunities for improving our world and affecting positive social change (Kolb, 1984; Dunlap et al., 2016).
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That we facilitate, through classroom activities, the exploration of individual perspectives and choices, and that learners are given the opportunity to reflect on the process of learning itself—that they would become able to reflect-in-action as scholar-practitioners (Argyris & Schön, 1974; Cunliffe, 2016).
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That all learning relationships have mutual inquiry at their foundation where mutual curiosity, the ability to listen deeply, and asking questions without judgment are highly valued (Hodgkinson, 1969).
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That those in learning relationships form an inclusive solidarity, honoring the value that every learner brings for understanding the world better and for asking positive questions together where positive
References
In putting these principles into an integrated, inclusive teaching and learning framework for action, Walden is building on both seminal approaches to andragogy and heutagogy and the most up-to-date research findings available to inform our goal of helping our learners achieve transformational learning (Mezirow, 1991) and become reflective and action-oriented scholar-practitioners who effect positive social change.
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. (1974). Theory in practice: Increasing professional effectiveness. Jossey Bass.
Cunliffe, A. L. (2016). On becoming a critically reflexive practitioner redux: What does it mean to “be” reflexive? Journal of Management Education, 40(6), 740–746.
Cooperrider, D. L. (2018). A time for action: Appreciative inquiry, positive peace and the making of a Nobel nomination. AI Practitioner, 20(1), 7–18.
Dunlap, J. C., Verma, G., & Johnson, H. L. (2016). Presence+Experience: A framework for the purposeful design of presence in online courses. TechTrends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve Learning, 60, 145–151.
Hodgkinson, H. L. (1969). Walden U.: A working paper. Soundings: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 52, 172–185.
Kolb, D. A. (1984). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. Prentice-Hall.
Landrine, H. (1992). Clinical implications of cultural differences: The referential versus the indexical self. Clinical Psychology Review, 12(4), 401–415.
Mezirow, J. (1991). Transformative dimensions of adult learning. Jossey-Bass.
Rogers, C. (1969). Freedom to learn: A view of what education might become. Charles E. Merrill Publishing.