For many students in Business School, the most
difficult courses are the foundational accounting courses i.e., Financial
Accounting and Managerial Accounting.
According to Velasco (2019), “Anywhere in the world, accounting is
highly regarded as one of the most challenging subjects in business programs”
(p. 157). He also goes on to state that this is usually associated with a high
rate of failure for these students (p. 157).
In addition to this, there is also a very high global failure rate; one
study suggested there was about a 42% failure in accounting at a Brazilian
university from 2008 to 2013 (Borges, Santos, Abbas, Marques, & Tonin,
2014). Even in the United States, this
percentage doesn’t change much (Hong, 2022). However, there have been great
strides made in changing this for the better.
Teaching techniques, study groups, and improved use of critical thinking
have all helped.
In this paper, the authors discuss teaching
techniques to be used to help students learn accounting content. One technique
is the use of experiential learning as a basis for creating a better
understanding of accounting concepts.
According to Chickering (1977), “Experiential learning can be viewed
from a number of standpoints: examples, observations, and applications” (p. 89)
and can be used to solidify concepts.
Along with this, the idea of bringing in experience from students’ own
perspectives and lives allows for a deep understanding. This paper explains how
the use of experiential learning, along with bringing in student experiences
and perspectives, will help bring about more success in the classroom related
to teaching and learning accounting principles.
The authors explore the benefits of using experience from the student
perspective to guide the teaching of accounting principles along with allowing
for hands-on experience during class time.
