The 4-H Learning Experience
Nancy Noyes
4-H Youth Development
Program Assistant
Let’s focus on how we as 4-H Educators, Volunteers and Parents make 4-H an interesting, challenging and fun learning environment for youth. A 1970’s study by the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare reported that youth learn best by doing and that active involvement of the learner is the key. The 4-H Program adopted the “Learn By Doing” model and has consistently offered a wide array of curriculum based on learning is fun when it is experiential. 
The 4-H Model also employs all the traditional learning styles realizing that we all learn through mixed styles. These styles collectively coined VARK; visual, aural/auditory, reading/writing and kinesthetic.
- Visual learners do well with information in graphic form. Maps and charts are just a few ways that a visual style of processing information helps some people learn.
- Aural/Auditory learners tend to learn best when materials are accessed out loud, such as with live lectures, listening to podcasts, or engaging in group discussions.
- Read/Write learners prefer information in written form. These learners access their information reading reports, essays, books, manuals or even websites tend to work best for people with this predominant style.
- Kinesthetic learners tend to learn best when physical movement is involved in the lesson or activity. Hands-on or experiential activities help people with this dominant learning style engage with information.
The experiential learning model allows youth to participate in engaging, stimulating activities that have a real-world basis. The activities help the learners to connect what they are learning to prior knowledge and apply it to new situations or problems. Just as importantly, engaging in shared learning experiences creates social and cultural bonds that influence identity, relationships, goals, and success.
Let’s look at a recent Douglas County 4-H event. The first week of February we hosted approximately 800 fourth-grade students from USD 497 for the “Day on the Farm” two-day experience. Collaborating with the school district, local environmental and agricultural agencies and organizations; we were able to bring experiential learning to the fairgrounds for our guests to participate in stations to move through that provided all or most of the learning styles listed above. Every station employed an experiential component- be it swirling their hands in a vat of seed corn, patting a baby goat, making up My Plate models for healthy eating, or walking through a soil model trailer. When informally surveyed students overwhelmingly recalled a hands-on activity, but the significant thing is they were also able to relate a fact they learned during the experience. That is what we call a Learn By Doing win!
