Search

In March 1908 a remarkable partnership was forged that would affect the practice and teaching of field biology for more than a century. Annie Montague Alexander, heiress to a Hawaiian [...]

Within the field of outdoor education, some theorists argue that although leaps and gains have been made in terms of educating for the intrapersonal or 'self'-development, they have come at the expense of the development of equally important relations with the local land and community (Hales, 2006; Loynes, 2002). Given this foregrounding of self over interpersonal and place-based relationships, this study aimed to explore the relationship to place that exists amongst members of a university education research team. In particular, it addresses how interpersonal relations might inform relationship with the land. The principle questions that guided the study were: What lessons can be learned from a space of 'deep listening' in place? And what might this offer to our lived experiences and understandings of outdoor and ecological education? The methodology of narrative inquiry was utilized to gain a deeper understanding of what place and human others have to teach by engaging with the stories they have to tell. Six themes emerged from the interviews based on what the participants deemed to be important in the process of listening to place and strengthening ecological relations. This paper explores each theme and shares possible implications for the field of outdoor education. Keywords: place-based education, listening; narrative inquiry, interpersonal relations, more-than-human world, Introduction A relationship with 'place' has the potential to transform our practice as educators. As Gruenewald (2003a) states, 'an understanding of it [place] is key to understanding the nature of [...] more...

The aim of this study was to identify the characteristics that led outdoor activity providers agree are necessary for the development of a new industry-wide incident reporting and learning system (UPLOADS). The study involved: 1) a literature review to identify a set of characteristics that are considered to be hallmarks of successful reporting and learning systems in other safety-critical domains; and (2) the presentation of these characteristics to 25 Australian led outdoor activity providers using a two round modified-Delphi technique to obtain consensus views on their relative importance in this domain. Thirteen out of 30 characteristics were endorsed as 'essential' for developing an incident reporting and learning system for the led outdoor activity sector, and a further 13 were endorsed as 'required'. 'Essential' characteristics primarily related to operational or practical characteristics of the system, while 'required' characteristics primarily related to system infrastructure, data quality and the basis for developing of countermeasures to address identified injury risks. The findings indicate that although led outdoor activity providers are primarily concerned that the demands of reporting do not adversely impact on their day to day operations, they also recognise that data collection methods and countermeasure development need to be of high quality. The paper concludes by highlighting some potential strategies for implementing the characteristics considered 'essential' and 'required'. Keywords: Incident database, risk management, safety, outdoor activity, Introduction The goal of the UPLOADS (Understanding and Preventing Led Outdoor Accidents Data System) project is to develop a standardised, national approach to incident reporting and learning for the outdoor [...] more...

We have used the experiences of teachers and their pupils to explore the impact of participation in a shared outdoor learning experience upon specific aspects of both the teacher/pupil and pupil/pupil relationship. Prior to their taking part in an out of classroom lesson the teachers involved in our project were relatively inexperienced in teaching out of doors. At that stage they expressed a view that the children in their class would respond to the novelty of being outside by misbehaving and that they would in effect 'lose control' of some of them. They also shared anxieties about losing their expert status as a result of being asked to teach outside of their comfort zone. After taking part in an outdoor lesson the same teachers described their pupils as being more engaged with learning and better behaved whilst outdoors than when in the classroom. They also expressed the view that through learning together and to some extent blurring their expert/pupil roles teachers and pupils had shared a positive learning experience. The children themselves expressed the view that they had enjoyed working together (with one another and with their teacher), that they had engaged with the tasks at hand, and that they had communicated with one another more effectively whilst learning. Keywords: Fieldwork, learning outdoors, primary science, children's behaviour, teacher confidence, Introduction Our interest in outdoor learning is particularly focused upon the value of an authentic experience of animals and plants in their natural environment as part of formal (or informal) [...] more...

Relationships are a critical component to the experience of an outdoor adventure education (OAE) program, therefore, more fruitful ways of investigating groups is needed. Social network analysis (SNA) is an effective tool to study the relationship structure of small groups. This paper provides an explanation of SNA and shows how it was used by the National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) to understand the relationship patterns among different course compositions with students receiving and not receiving scholarships (course compositions included two students, 50% of students, and all students receiving scholarship). Data were collected from three 30-day courses at three different time points throughout the course and were based on two dimensions of cohesion (social and task). The findings suggest that the most homogeneous group (in regard to scholarship recipients) possessed greater social cohesion and the least homogenous group possessed greater task cohesion. Social network analysis should be used more frequently in OAE because it offers a flexible approach to understand groups and group processes. Keywords: Small groups, relationships, cohesion, NOLS, group structure, Introduction The small group nature of outdoor adventure education (OAE) plays a critical role in the types of experiences students have during a course. Interpersonal relationships are a critical component [...] more...

The school field trip has a long history in American public education. For decades, students have piled into yellow buses to visit a variety of cultural institutions, including art, natural [...]

It's a cold January day and the remnants of last week's snowstorm are still clumped on the ground, piled into mini-mountains scraped up by the city's vigilant snowplows. I stand [...]

Experiential approaches to learning underpin teaching and learning strategies in outdoor adventure education (OAE). Recent critiques of experiential learning have problematised the individualistic and overly cognitive focus of this approach which creates binaries between experience-reflection and the learner-situation. This paper summarises these critiques and investigates the possibilities made available by understanding OAE from a socio-cultural perspective. Consideration of OAE students as participants in a highly orchestrated community of practice places learning, and observable change, within a socio-cultural frame rather than as primarily a function of cognitive processes within the individual. This position takes seriously the claims made by practitioners of 'seeing evidence of change' and researchers who raise questions about the validity of 'generalised claims' by placing greater emphasis on the situated nature of learning and acting. Moving beyond conceptions of the learner as an autonomous 'processor' of experiences, who is capable of generating context free knowledge, has implications for existing OAE theory and practice., Introduction The emphasis on interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships is frequently deemed to be the primary focus of outdoor adventure education (OAE) programmes (Hill, 2007; Priest & Gass, 1997; Zink & [...] more...

A key signpost to a profession is clarity of disciplinary knowledge. In this paper I describe the content and outcome of a process to refine the qualification guidelines for outdoor education teachers in Victorian, Australia. The guidelines, developed for the Victorian Institute of Teaching, include both practical skills and disciplinary knowledge. These can help differentiate outdoor education from other areas such as physical education. The practical skill areas that form the basis of the outdoor education teacher guidelines are summarised in the paper. The disciplinary knowledge required of outdoor education teachers includes content such as human interaction with natural environments, activity knowledge, safety and ecological literacy. Ecological literacy has been less often described in past editions of AJOE. In the latter half of the paper I therefore describe, with reference to David Orr (1992, 2004), the value and relevance of ecological literacy for outdoor education. I conclude that ecological literacy could be developed as a key rationale and practice for outdoor education in schooling., Introduction In this paper I describe the content and outcome of the process to refine qualification guidelines for outdoor education teachers in schools in Victoria, Australia. The initial section of [...] more...

Abstract A study was conducted to develop a technical skills assessment tool for the training and development of challenge course facilitators. Researchers accessed two professional on-line listserves to collect a [...] more...

Recent articles have described the advantages of teaching elementary statistics and probability classes using approaches that encourage greater student engagement, including experimentation, with the subject matter. We describe our experiences in introducing the subject of random walks to small groups of high-school and first-year college students. As we show in this article, the topic of random walks provides a superb way for instructors to introduce a class to elementary simulation problems, calculation of expectations and measures of variability for geometric distributions, real-world interpretation and consequences for the divergence of infinite series, and the behavior of random walks on restricted sets in the plane. Most enchantingly, all facets of this journey are entirely accessible to an involved class of students equipped with minimal knowledge of calculus. Based on our experiences, we strongly recommend student involvement in the teaching of introductory concepts to small classes. KEY WORDS: Chance database project; Collaborative learning; Jack-or-Jill controversy; Involvement-based teaching; Statistical education., 1. INTRODUCTION Hogg (1996), Magel (1996), Gelman and Glickman (2000), and other authors have described some advantages accruing to students and faculty when introductory statistics and probability classes use approaches [...] more...

Outdoor adventure is a social practice, or a collection of various social practices (as are all human endeavors). When individuals engage in outdoor adventure activities they may claim to be [...]

An outdoor activity which can be used to teach estimation and measurement of circles is presented. The activity involves estimating how many leaves of a tree would fill the circumference of the tree's crown. Recommendations on how to extend the activity for upper grades are also given. more...

Integrating literacy-related activities across the curriculum is an effective and widely accepted teaching strategy (Tompkins, 2005). Providing print-related props in early childhood learning centers is a well-established practice for increasing [...] more...