Developing sustainability-literate citizens through outdoor learning: possibilities for outdoor education in Higher Education

UNESCO's challenge to Higher Education institutions to provide educational leadership in sustainable development, provides an impetus to develop innovative, interdisciplinary curricula and pedagogy. Whereas Higher Education curricula in sustainability and sustainable development have tended to come from the environmental sciences, recent studies have highlighted the need for more holistic, experiential, interdisciplinary approaches. As a pedagogical approach, outdoor learning may have something to offer since it lends itself to holistic and experiential learning and enables integration of knowledge and skills from a range of discipline areas. Outdoor and environmental education research suggests that educational experiences in outdoor settings can be significant in developing environmental sensitivity and knowledge. Such knowledge and attitudes are components of ecological literacy and, more recently, sustainability literacy. This paper considers how outdoor experiential pedagogy might contribute to the current sustainability education agenda. It focuses on Higher Education since this sector has the obligation and the capability of instigating a ‘ripple’ effect' in developing sustainability-literate citizens. It discusses possibilities and issues arising from a review of outdoor, environmental and sustainability education literature, particularly, but not exclusively, from the UK. The paper is a precursor to an empirical study into how outdoor learning might contribute to the development of sustainability-literate graduates.     

‘It's good for their self-esteem’: the substance beneath the label

This paper provides an informed and critical understanding of the concept of self-esteem. It explores this psychological construct in relation to its use in adventure education and outdoor learning. Enhancing a participant's self-esteem is perceived to be fundamentally a good thing and is culturally linked to the Hahnian notion that implies outdoor education is good for character-building and more recently personal development. This paper suggests that the improvement of self-esteem has become a reified programme outcome as well as an argument for the value and importance of outdoor education programmes. In this paper I seek to address the often uncritical and at times evangelical claim that outdoor programmes enhance self-esteem. This paper looks at the development of self-esteem generally and then considers its appearance in the outdoor education literature. Aspects of this that relate to outdoor learning and adventure education include: development of the self, behaviour, disaffected young people, recent UK developments and common misconceptions regarding self-esteem. These are explored and their implications for practice and research are considered. The essence of this paper is that outdoor educators need to be more critical, informed and specific about exactly what it is they are trying to achieve, how their programmes are evaluated, particularly with outcomes that are related to potential changes in ‘self’ and how these changes are measured.     

Students’ imaginings of spaces of learning in Outdoor and Environmental Education

In this article, I interrogate students’ stories about the spaces and places in a tertiary Outdoor and Environmental Education course that support and shape their environmental ethics. Drawing on a longitudinal qualitative study, I explore the ways in which particular sites of learning (outdoor, practical learning) are privileged and how particular stories of outdoor spaces get reproduced. I employ the work of poststructuralist geography scholar Doreen Massey in my analysis to highlight the intersections between space, relations of power and identity. This analysis also underscores the simultaneity of multiple and conflicting stories around Outdoor Education’s outdoor (practical) and indoor (theoretical) learning spaces. I conclude by drawing on Elizabeth Ellsworth’s work on anomalous places of learning to explore some of the spaces in-between the indoor/outdoor binary as a way of interrupting and re-imagining places and spaces of learning in Outdoor Education.     

An Exploration of Pre-Service Teachers' Experiences in Outdoor ‘Places’ and Intentions for Teaching in the Outdoors

This study explores pre-service teachers' past interactions with ‘place’ in outdoor settings and how these experiences contribute to their current perceptions of the importance of taking their own students into the outdoors. Specifically, the researchers were interested in investigating if current pre-service teachers are part of the ‘nature-deficit disorder' generation described by Louv in his book, Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder (2005 Louv, R. (2005). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature deficit disorder. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books. [Google Scholar]), as a generation of children growing up without direct experiences in nature. Study participants included 148 undergraduate pre-service elementary teachers enrolled in science teaching methods instructional courses at an urban college in the Northeastern United States and two suburban universities in the Southeastern United States. Participants wrote essay responses after reading Louv's Last Child in the Woods in which they were asked to relate the reading to their own past experiences and their ideas about elementary science education. Results indicate that a large majority of participants (97%) describe significant youth experiences in the outdoors, view nature as important in varying ways (89.9%), and express a desire to expose their own students to the outdoors (65.5%). Key findings are illustrated with direct quotations from the pre-service teachers' essay responses, as they write vividly of their interactions in outdoor places, referred to as ‘place meanings'. Implications are presented for teacher educators working with pre-service teachers to build upon their outdoor experiences and prepare them for implementing nature-based instruction.     

高校户外运动课风险管理探究及应对策略

户外运动这一新兴体育课程,具有一定的探险性质,为避免和减少风险事故的发生,文章运用文献资料法,针对存在的诸多风险因素进行分析,并从风险管理学中的应对策略,如风险应急、降低风险、转移风险、规避风险、执行与监督等方法来规范户外运动课程,健全和完善事故发生的应对能力和措施,为高校中户外运动课程的健康、有序开展提供参考。     

阿嵯耶观音造像研究现状与展望

阿嵯耶观音是南诏大理国时期非常独特的一类佛教造像,其研究存在起步晚,过分倚重于一些期刊、图书、图片等文献及有限的实物资料,轻视基础资料的全面收集和整理,研究方法过于单一且缺乏创新与突破的问题。运用考古学、民族学、美术史学、文献史学相结合的研究方法,协同各学科领域的专家学者,展开跨学科、跨区域的宏观性、整合性研究,不仅是解决该项研究所面临的问题,走出困境并有所突破的有效途径,亦是对南诏大理历史文化研究在理念、方法上的思考与创新。     

泥塑的空间造型元素对玉雕设计的启示

玉器造型追求形式美,讲究动静相衬、虚实相生,玉器之美源于空间塑造。现代玉雕对空间美的追求与泥塑写生异曲同工。泥塑写生训练所涉及的"材料、形体、线型、空间"这些元素正是构成玉雕艺术整体造型、节奏和韵律的本质。     

试论女子形体塑造中核心力量训练

目前我国对于＂核心力量＂在竞技训练方面研究较多,但在教学和健身方面的运用研究少。本文通过广大女性追求完美的形体为目标,研究分析什么是形体美,运用核心力量训练减脂、塑造良好姿态、预防颈腰疾病及运动损伤、增加运动机能的功能,如何帮助女性走出力量训练的误区,进行分析和研究。