Edgar Dale's Cone of Experience

 

Edgar Dale’s Cone of Experience helps L&D professionals to plan learning experiences that take advantage of the most effective learning environments. This 11-stage model places multimedia elements into categories based on their ‘concreteness’. This is the multimedia asset’s ability to stave off abstractness and capture reality with varying degrees of veracity.

Sounds pretty complicated, right? In a nutshell, Dale’s Cone of Experience showcases how we can use a variety of materials and media to maximise learner experiences.

Known in some circles as the ‘Learning Pyramid’, Dale’s Cone of Experience is one of the most commonly misrepresented learning theories.

But before we clear up the misconceptions, let’s take a step back and learn more about Edgar Dale, the father of the Cone of Experience.

Who Is Edgar Dale?

Edgar Dale was born in 1900, and he grew up on a family farm in North Dakota, United States. He earned both his Bachelor's and Master's degrees from the University of North Dakota and made his way as a teacher in a small rural school.

Dale completed his PhD at the University of Chicago and joined the Eastman Kodak Company. Nowadays simply known as Kodak, the company remains a dominant player in the photography industry.

This can be seen as the start of his research career. After all, Dale completed some of the earliest studies on learning from film while at Eastman Kodak Company.

After this, Dale enjoyed a long career as a professor at Ohio State University (1929-1970). He also served as President of the Division of Visual Instruction of the National Education Association (NEA), now known as the Association for Educational Communication and Technology.

In addition to mentoring doctoral students and working as a professor, Dale made significant contributions in many areas of research. To name a few, his work includes:

• How to Appreciate Motion Pictures (1933)
• Teaching with Motion Pictures (1937)
• Audiovisual Methods in Teaching (1946, 1954, 1969)
• Building a Learning Environment (1972)
• The Living Word Vocabulary: The Words We Know (1976)
• The Educator’s Quotebook (1984)

According to Wagner (1970), Dale used his position to fight relentlessly for a better school system, academic freedom, and civil rights.

The Cone of Experience

In his first edition of Audiovisual Methods in Teaching (1946), Dale introduced the ‘Cone of Experience’. The Cone placed different educational media and methods in a continuum from the most concrete experiences at the bottom to the most abstract at the top.

When a learner moves from direct and purposeful experiences to verbal symbols, the degree of abstraction gradually grows. And as a result, learners become spectators rather than participants.

Learners can see, handle, taste, touch, feel, and smell the most purposeful experiences. By contrast, verbal symbols, such as the use of words, speech, or auditory language, at the peak of the Cone are highly abstract. This means they do not have a physical resemblance to the objects or ideas in question.

As such, the Cone of Experience explains the interrelationships of the various types of media and their individual ‘positions’ in the learning process. This makes it a valuable tool that helps instructional designers and L&D professionals incorporate the right audiovisual materials into their classroom or online training interventions.

‘Corrupted Cone’ – Common Misconceptions

Dale intended to produce an intuitive model of the concreteness of various kinds of audiovisual media. However, the model has been widely and frequently misunderstood and misused.

The Cone is often wrongly referred to as the ‘Cone of Learning’, ‘Learning Pyramid’ or ‘Remembering Cone’. What some refer to as the ‘corrupted cone’ is now widely misunderstood as Dale’s Cone of Experience.

Let’s play a game of spot the difference. The illustration directly below is what most share as the ‘Cone of Experience’. You’ve probably seen it before, on social media, or in an article about effective learning approaches.

As we can see from the illustrations, the corrupted model purports to inform learners of how much people remember based on how they receive information. According to it, learners generally remember:

• 10% of what they read.
• 20% of what they hear.
• 30% of what they see.
• 50% of what they hear and see.
• 70% of what they say and write.
• And 90% of what do.

Now that we have overcome some of the misconceptions, let’s have a look at the eleven levels of Dale’s authentic Cone of Experience.

The base of the model is characterised by more concrete experiences. These include direct experiences, contrived experiences, and dramatic participation.

The middle of the Cone is slightly more abstract, where learners observe without action. These experiences are less concrete than the lower levels, as learners do not interact directly with the phenomenon.

The peak of the Cone displays the most abstract experiences, which are represented with limited degrees of realism by symbols. These include visual and verbal symbols, like listening to the spoken word..

11. Verbal Symbols

As explored, each level of the Cone moves the learner a step further away from real-life experiences. As such, experiences focusing only on the use of verbal symbols are the furthest removed from real life.

Verbal symbols are highly abstract as they bear no physical resemblance to the objects or ideas they stand for. In fact, these verbal symbols provide no visual representation or clues to their meaning.

10. Visual Symbols 

The other highly abstract level includes visual symbols, such as charts, maps, graphs, and diagrams that are used for conceptual representation. These visual symbols help to make just about any reality into something easier to understand.

9. Recordings, Radio, and Still Pictures 

Edgar Dale first created this model in 1946. As such, he included the multimedia assets of his time, such as recordings, radio, and still pictures. In more modern terms, this level could include photos, podcasts, or audio files.

8. Motion Pictures and 7. Educational Television

Most recent publications combine levels eight and seven into one category. After all, motion pictures and television are similar media. They enable learners to process real-life processes or events through on-screen recordings.

Motion pictures and educational television include, for example, videos, animations, and TV programmes, which imply value and messages through moving pictures. These are abstract experiences, as learners focus on observation instead of active participation

6. Exhibits

The sixth level of Dale’s Cone of Experience moves us away from the most abstract experiences. This is the first level that opens the door for an expanded range of sensory and participatory experiences.

As a result, this experience allows learners to see the meaning and relevance of things based on the different pictures and representations presented. Visiting exhibits in educational outlets like museums is a common way to provide learning opportunities.

5. Study Trips

Study trips offer the sights and sounds of real-world settings. The main activity focuses on observing from the sidelines, aside from occasional opportunities to participate. Participation could include, for instance, hopping in a fire truck or milking a cow.

These rich experiences help learners to learn more about different objects, systems, and situations. As such, study trips provide an opportunity to experience something that learners cannot encounter within the traditional classroom space.

4. Demonstrations

A demonstration is a visualised explanation of facts, ideas or processes. They are a common way to train employees or students, as they require relatively little preparation and resources. After all, individuals observe a lot simply by watching others.

3. Dramatised Experiences

Dramatised experiences can be seen as role-play exercises. This means reconstructing situations for learning purposes. As a result, the third level involves shifting learners — at least some of them — from observers to active participants.

This enables learners to participate in reconstructed experiences that could give them a better understanding of the idea or concept. In this manner, dramatising real-life experiences can help learners to get closer to certain realities that are not easily available firsthand.

2. Contrived Experiences

The second level is called contrived experiences, which focuses on the ‘editing’ of reality. At this level, teachers use representative models and mock-ups to provide an experience that is as realistic as possible.

This can make the concept easier to grasp. After all, some realities are far too complex to take in all at once. As such, contrived experiences are imitations that sometimes teach better than the realities they imitate.

1. Direct Purposeful Experiences

The bottom level of Dale’s Cone of Experience is also the least abstract. Direct purposeful experiences are hands-on activities that grant us responsibility for driving a specific outcome. We are active agents in the learning experience. In a sense, direct purposeful experiences are an unabridged version of life itself.

The Cone of Experience was first created decades ago, in 1946. And even decades after his passing, Dale’s work continues to influence the educational technologies field. Its utility in selecting instructional resources and activities is just as practical today as when Dale created the Cone.

In his 1969 version of Audiovisual Methods in Teaching, Dale introduced ‘rich experiences’. According to Dale, effective learning environments should offer memorable and rich experiences where learners can use multiple senses. He characterised rich experiences as follows:

• Students use their eyes, ears, noses, mouths, and hands to explore and immerse in the experience.
• Learners have the chance to discover new experiences.
• Training events are emotionally rewarding and will motivate participants to continue learning throughout their lives.
• Students have the opportunity to reflect on their past experiences to create new ones.
• Learners get a sense of personal achievement.
• And students can create their own dynamic experiences.

Lastly, Dale’s Cone of Experience is a wildly misunderstood model. Despite this, it remains useful even for today’s weathered instructional designers.

After all, it showcases how we can use a variety of materials and mediums to maximise learner experiences. It also helps us to think about the sensory impact of our learning content.

Reference: https://www.growthengineering.co.uk/what-is-edgar-dales-cone-of-experience/