Outdoor education: a new way of teaching and learning

“We could have never loved the earth so well, if we had no childhood in it” – G. Eliot

​Outdoor Education is one of the most relevant innovative teaching approach in the educational landscape. It offers the possibility to address two amongst the most important topics of today’s society: providing long-lasting high quality education and raising awareness on the importance of preserving our planet in the face of the daunting threat of climate change.

How is this possible?

​During our course from 10/10 to 16/10, our group of 12 teachers from Spain, Greece, Hungary, Latvia and Romania explored the different ways to reach these two outcomes. 

Starting from the definition of Outdoor Education, we explored the different ways in which we can guide our students to come in contact with the outdoor, which doesn’t always imply to be in nature and forests. Indeed, we dedicated one part of the training to Urban Outdoor Education in the city, developing scavenger hunts in the city centre of Bologna. Our colleagues learned to teach subjects like science, maths, music, art, language and more by testing activities which guided their attention to the surroundings.

Another part of the course was focused on practicing many tools in a natural environment in a local park area of Bologna, near the San Luca sanctuary. All the games and activities tested were much appreciated and gave inspiration to our participant not only in sharing their activities with the rest of the group, but also to create their own Outdoor activity. 

Indeed, the last part of the course was dedicated to designing an outdoor experience ad hoc for each participant’s target group. After studying the principles of outdoor learning approach, discovering the 10 Kurt Hahn rules and their true meaning, getting in touch with many different urban and natural activities, in the last day of the course each participant designed an outdoor lesson based on the subject taught. 

​Taking into consideration the level of age of their pupils, and the skills and topics they wanted to address, each teacher planned in details the session, presented it to the other participants of the course and received feedback on how to improve it. ​This week was a true example itself of the efficacy of experiential outdoor learning: with our hands-on approach, participants had a real taste of what an outdoor education activity looks like and acquired the knowledge needed to plan one for their pupils.

"I really enjoyed this practice-based course with knowledgeable and enthusiastic trainers. It was a good chance for networking with other teachers as well!" - György from Hungary 

More info on this course at https://www.erasmustrainingcourses.com/outdoor-education.html