Abstract
Global environmental issues have increased the value of outdoor education. Outdoor education is an educational method that is widely used all over the world, although the concept has many meanings (Rickinson et al., 2004; Bilton, 2010). According to researches it can have a great influence to the attitudes of young people (Chawla & Flanders, 2007). There are plenty of educational themes especially in biology and geography education, but also in other school subjects, which would be easier to understand and learn in nature than in the classroom (Barker et al., 2002). This all underlines the relevance to use outdoor education in the education of teacher trainees.
In the beginning of the second year of primary teacher studies in the University of Helsinki (Finland), teacher students have a new course of didactics of biology and geography (5 etc, started in 2016). In this course biology and geography were taught separately. The field trip was part of the biology group lessons, but there was content from both biology and geography. After the biology lessons teacher students (120) had to write an essay by themselves or with a pair about a theme, which they feel is important. In this research we used those biology essays, which were written from the theme outdoor education. There were 59 essays from this theme.
The main purpose of this research is to find out what kind of meanings the teacher students give to the outdoor education. We also try to find out a) have students understood the meaning of making perceptions, b) have students understood how to implement the outdoor education in their work and c) have students mentioned integration and phenomenon based teaching methods when designing the outdoor education? The used research method was content analysis.
References
Barker, S., Slingsby, D. and Tilling, S. (2002). Teaching biology outside the classroom. Is it heading for extinction? A report on biology fieldwork in the 14-19 curriculum. British Ecological Society.
Bilton, H. (2010). Outdoor Learning in the Early Years. Management and innovation. London, Routledge.
Chawla, L. & Flanders Cushing, D. (2007). Education for strategic environmental behavior. Environmental Education Research 13(4), 437–452.
Rickinson, M., Dillon, J., Teamey, K., Morris, M., Choi, M.Y., Sanders, D. and Benefield, P. (2004). A Review of research on outdoor Learning. National Foundation for Educational Research and King´s College London.
In the beginning of the second year of primary teacher studies in the University of Helsinki (Finland), teacher students have a new course of didactics of biology and geography (5 etc, started in 2016). In this course biology and geography were taught separately. The field trip was part of the biology group lessons, but there was content from both biology and geography. After the biology lessons teacher students (120) had to write an essay by themselves or with a pair about a theme, which they feel is important. In this research we used those biology essays, which were written from the theme outdoor education. There were 59 essays from this theme.
The main purpose of this research is to find out what kind of meanings the teacher students give to the outdoor education. We also try to find out a) have students understood the meaning of making perceptions, b) have students understood how to implement the outdoor education in their work and c) have students mentioned integration and phenomenon based teaching methods when designing the outdoor education? The used research method was content analysis.
References
Barker, S., Slingsby, D. and Tilling, S. (2002). Teaching biology outside the classroom. Is it heading for extinction? A report on biology fieldwork in the 14-19 curriculum. British Ecological Society.
Bilton, H. (2010). Outdoor Learning in the Early Years. Management and innovation. London, Routledge.
Chawla, L. & Flanders Cushing, D. (2007). Education for strategic environmental behavior. Environmental Education Research 13(4), 437–452.
Rickinson, M., Dillon, J., Teamey, K., Morris, M., Choi, M.Y., Sanders, D. and Benefield, P. (2004). A Review of research on outdoor Learning. National Foundation for Educational Research and King´s College London.
| Original language | Finnish |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Book of Abstracts |
| Publication date | 2017 |
| Publication status | Published - 2017 |
| MoE publication type | A4 Article in conference proceedings |
| Event | NoFa 6-conference 2017: : Interplay between general and subject specific knowledge about teaching and learning in school and teacher education - perspectives - University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark Duration: 29 May 2017 → 31 May 2017 http://www.sdu.dk/en/nofa6 |