Embedding Action Learning for Inclusive Classrooms, Workspaces, and Communities

In our increasingly diverse and interconnected world, the need for inclusive spaces, whether in schools, organisations, or community settings, is more urgent than ever. One powerful, often underutilised approach to driving inclusive practice is Action Learning.

What is Action Learning?

At its core, Action Learning is a hands-on, reflective method of professional and personal development. Participants come together in small teams (called learning sets) to tackle real-world problems. Unlike traditional training, there is no expert delivering content from the front of the room. Instead, learning emerges through doing, questioning, and reflecting, and in the process, deeper insights, innovative solutions, and inclusive mindsets are cultivated.

Revans (1998), the pioneer of Action Learning, summed it up with the simple formula:

L = P + Q
Learning (L) = Programmed knowledge (P) + Questioning insight (Q)

This balance of structured knowledge and open inquiry is what makes Action Learning especially suited to inclusive development.

Why Use Action Learning to Support Inclusion?

Inclusion isn’t a checklist, it’s a mindset. And mindsets are best shifted through experience and reflection. Here's how Action Learning supports that process:

1. Bridges Voices Across Difference

Because Action Learning sets are typically diverse, team members learn to listen deeply to one another’s lived experiences. Issues are explored collaboratively, and inclusion isn’t just discussed, it’s practiced.

2. Solves Real Problems, Together

Whether it's an inclusive teaching strategy in a classroom or a culturally responsive policy in a workplace, Action Learning grounds inclusion in action. Teams work on meaningful, often complex projects that benefit the larger organisation or community, creating shared ownership and responsibility.

3. Encourages Reflection and Adaptive Thinking

Action Learning builds a culture of reflection, critical questioning, and continuous improvement. These habits are essential for navigating inclusion-related challenges, which often require rethinking assumptions and trying new approaches.

4. Promotes Distributed Leadership

Rather than relying on one 'inclusion champion', Action Learning empowers every participant to take initiative, reflect on their impact, and lead change from wherever they are in the system.

What Does It Look Like in Practice?

Picture a feedback loop model where inclusive practice is not only encouraged but embedded:

1. Diverse learning sets meet regularly to identify challenges, especially those involving equity or exclusion.
2. Issues are explored using a structured five-step process: describe, question, define, consult, act.
3. Team insights are shared with decision-makers who then adapt systems and policies.
4. Outcomes and changes are fed back to the learning sets, refining practice over time.
5. Inclusion is no longer a separate initiative—it becomes a way of working.
   

This iterative model of double-loop learning (Argyris & Schön, 1978) ensures that both individuals and systems grow together.

Embedding Action Learning Across Sectors

In Classrooms:

Teachers form learning sets to explore inclusive pedagogy, such as supporting neurodiverse learners or embedding cultural safety. They trial strategies, reflect, and refine approaches in real-time.

In Workplaces:

Staff teams address equity in recruitment, team dynamics, or leadership pathways. They uncover blind spots and implement more inclusive processes.

In Communities: 

Residents collaborate on projects like inclusive play spaces, youth-led initiatives, or local reconciliation strategies. Through shared action, trust and transformation grow.

Getting Started

To embed Action Learning in your setting:

• Start small: Gather a diverse, voluntary team around a real, shared issue.
• Ensure top-down support: Leadership buy-in is critical for lasting change.
• Facilitate with intention: Create safe spaces for honest dialogue and deep listening.
• Reflect often: Build in time for reflection and evaluation—it’s where the real learning happens.
• Share learning: Feed outcomes into broader organisational or community systems.
  

Final Thoughts

Inclusion thrives where people are invited not just to share space, but to shape it. Action Learning makes this possible by turning lived experience into leadership, and challenges into shared breakthroughs. When embedded intentionally, it becomes more than a professional development tool, it becomes a culture-building force.

So whether you're a teacher, team leader, or community organiser, consider this question:

What’s one issue of exclusion or inequity we could learn our way through, together?