Outdoor Experiential Environmental Education: An Adult-Centred Intervention for the Affective Domain

Abstract

The aim of this research is to evaluate the impact of an outdoor experiential environmental education (OEEE) programme on the affective domain of adult participants – namely, in-service teachers from Turkey. Data collection methods such as; psychodrama, non-participant observation, open-ended questions and content analysis were used within a qualitative approach in a case study format. Activities in both the indoor and outdoor experiential programmes were designed in accordance with Kolb’s theory on experiential teaching. While the indoor activities were used for control group 1, and traditional methods used for control group 2; the outdoor activities were used for the experimental group. At the end of the research, the following terms emerged in participants’ expressions: ‘interest, anxiety, curiosity, motivation and complaint’. The most outstanding expressions belonged to the experimental outdoor group.

Keywords

• outdoor education,environmental education,affective domain,experiential education,Kolb’s experiential theory