An Investigation of Elementary School Teachers’ Experiences about Outdoor Education Activities Project

Abstract

This research with the title of the project called “Outdoor Education Activities for Elementary School Teachers” was carried out within the framework of TUBITAK (Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey) 4005 Innovative Education Implementations Support Program. The aim of the applied project carried out for 10 days with 28 elementary school teachers working in Ankara was to enable elementary school teachers to enhance their knowledge and skills about planning and administering out of school activities. By organizing trips to Rahmi Koç Musem, Ali Dayı Children’s Library, Feza Gürsey Science Centre, Şehit Cuma Dağ Natural History Museum, Gordion Museum, Beypazarı and Salt Lake, it was aimed that teachers would learn the characteristics outdoor education activities via experiential learning and the implementations were supported with the theoretical principles of outdoor education. Both qualitative and quantitative data collection tools were used in the process which was completed with the teachers’ development of their own outdoor education activities. “Self-Efficacy Belief Scale for Planning and Organizing Educational Trips to Out of School Settings” and “An Evaluation Form on Outdoor Education Activities Project for Elementary Teachers” were administered to the teachers at the beginning and at the end of the process. At the end of the project, semi-structured interviews were carried out with 5 elementary school teachers. The results obtained revealed that teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs about planning and organizing educational trips to out of school settings increased. Moreover, teachers comprehended the importance of planning outdoor education activities and the qualities of planning process at the end of the process and in addition to this, it can be stated that the participants’ awareness about the definition of outdoor education and characteristics increased, their prejudices about the feasibility of outdoor education decreased and thus their motivation to organize trips could have raised. In order to promote the applicability of outdoor education in elementary schools, projects and in-service training should be organized to increase elementary school teachers’ knowledge and skills about this subject and the courses in undergraduate studies should include education outside the class. Thus, the applicability of this process must be provided by enriching it with establishing relationship between disciplines via rich materials and teaching methods such as drama.