Conference Review: Lessons from Near and Far 03/07/2015

A week ago I have attended the international outdoor learning conference in London. I presented my paper on examining the links between the design of outdoor learning environment and children’s learning. I have also presented a poster on the design of a school ground in a primary school in Bangladesh. This oneday conference was very intense and informative. I cannot remember of such an engaging and successful gathering in recent times as every one was talking on the very topic on which I am living since my undergraduate studies.

The aim of the conference was primarily to inform the policy about the findings of the research on potentials of learning in the natural environment at different countries of the world.

The morning session of the conference comprised of the introductory speech followed by four keynote papers on research and policy in four different countries of the world. I found the objective of the conference and my research coincide in many ways like-

-          Build evidence for policy makers (I also aim design professionals, teachers and education officers)

-          To strengthen the evidence on the relationship between Outdoor learning and academic attainment (and also motivation and willingness to come to school)

We also need to get informed about the changes in practice. We always talk that research and practice should work together. The researchers are working on creating more and more evidence on the positive impact of the outdoor learning on children’s health, learning and well-being. But still there is a gap. Research needs to come out with the evidence that is easily transferable to practice.

The Natural connections LINE project has been working on a longitudinal study in 125 schools in England. In order to remove the barriers to OL the project aims to stimulate the demand for OL from schools, to support the schools in the practice of OL and to stimulate high quality OL. The findings are quite impressive as it is found that OL engages pupils in learning, supports academic achievement, has a positive impact on behavior, and improves health and well-being and pupil’s social skills. The authors suggested that in order to remove the barriers we need to have a funded lead organization, establish peer to peer support networks, have high quality teachers, have a compelling evidence base, conduct more flexible, school centered research, create responsive, local solutions, follow multiplatform design media approaches and develop partnerships of people.

The outdoor learning practice in Singapore involves one camp in primary school and two camps in secondary school. Singapore has shown a progression over time starting from 1991. Establishment of OL is following a top-down approach as its already in the policy of Ministry of Education. The core values of OL are self awareness, self management, social awareness, relationship management and responsible decision making which will eventually create a confident person, self-directed learner, active contributor and concerned Singaporean. The objectives of OE in Physical Education are physical health and well-being, risk assessment and management and sense of place. Singapore can be an example for any country who can follow the path and create an impact through OL.

Udeskole in Denmark is a perfect example of how top-down and bottom-up approaches can work together successfully. Its not a long journey beginning in 1999 with an open access website udeskole.dk offering free OL resources for the teachers. Danish teachers used to take the children to the outdoors for teaching (not guided by the curriculum). The teachers used to do it on their own account. Later on in 2010 the first PhD thesis by Dr Peter Bensten on green spaces and OL is completed. Two researchers submitted a proposal to the ministry- research project: Udeskole. In 2014 1.2 million pounds have been sanctioned by the ministry of education for the development of udeskole. New Danish School Act came out. Mygind and Bensten were looking into the impact of Udeskole on children’s physical activity, learning, social relations and teaching of maths and Danish language. This is a four years study where mixed methods research strategy is being followed. Udeskole included longer and more varied school day, more PE and physical exercise and activity and open school i.e. working closely with local sports, clubs and cultural centers. In the coming two years udeskole aims to the development of 50 new udeskole, research upon the development project and official udeskole webpage and materials. 

The next keynote speech on learning through adventure is an eye-opener. Whatever be the environment- indoors or outdoors the teaching should be adventurous instead of being "Mcdonalized" (rationalized, prescribed, calculable, predictable). There are four criteria of learning through adventure- uncertainty, agency, authenticity and mastery. The combination of this four in teaching can equip the pupils with the tools to survive in a constantly changing world. The fact is that outdoor environment with its richness and diversity can be an appropriate context for the practice of adventurous teaching/learning.

The impact of residential experiences on pupil’s health and learning is being researched by learningaway. Mixed methods research strategy has been followed where survey data has been collected from 61 schools and 100 focus groups. Data were collected on 9 different key areas. Like any other research it also proved the positive impact of the outdoors and generated some quantitative data which is lacked to some way. The recommendations are- to ensure staff freedom to design curriculum, thematic curriculum and to create evidence base.

The four key note speeches were summarized by Professor Karen Malone. The key challenge is to address the issue of children’s spending less time in the outdoors. In rural areas of some countries like Bangladesh situation is different where children spend more time in the outdoors. The challenge is somehow different- to attract children towards school, to motivate them to come to school and to study. The school ground affords them less opportunity to explore compared to their neighbourhood where they like to spend time instead of going to school. Can a well-designed outdoor environment attract them to school? (By the way that’s my research question). The weakness in evidence is lack of quantitative study, longer term larger scale evaluation studies and piecemeal studies. Studies are even rare in the context of developing countries. The evidence generated through research are not well communicated with the people in practice. How these connections can be made? By more conferences?- where generally the people from academia gather and therefore the results don’t transmit beyond the boundary.

 As OL also refers to learning in the school ground, how that school ground should look like to accommodate OL? School grounds have been designed always considering children’s play behavior and informal learning through play. Now as the purpose of the school ground is more inclusive- using this for teaching curriculum content, the design approach is also needed to be changed or become more inclusive. How to design the school ground so that it can accommodate OL? Here comes the design professionals or research in another field- architecture/landscape architecture/interior architecture. And both these fields should be connected and work together. There is a whole unit in Moray House School of Education on Outdoor Learning and there is OPENspace research center in Edinburgh School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture where I am doing my PhD. But are they connected? People are working on the same issue separately but is there any common project or platform where both the education school and architecture school are working together? I know some PhDs in these two schools with one supervisor from other school but is there a common platform? So along with feeding the policy we also need to make sure we are not spending time on the same thing separately and in an isolated manner. This type of conference should attract more presenters or participants from other related fields.

After my presentation I was intelligently asked about the context of Bangladesh for OL. But the interesting thing is that whatever be the challenge, solution is the same- Learning in the Outdoors. When children are spending less time in the outdoors or spending so much time in the outdoors that you cannot take them to the classroom to study then there is only one solution- bring the study to the outdoors. This will make the children more engaged with what they are learning, make the learning real and therefore motivating them to learn.

Conference delegates having their lunch in the courtyard (As its an outdoor learning conference I could not help posting a photo of the outdoors)



*** My very own reflection on the conference which might be limited due to many reasons including lacking in my knowledge and understanding. I just tried to relate the things I learnt to my own research.