Evaluation of outdoor school activities of an institutional program

Abstract

Environmental education and outdoor learning in schools are signs of quality since ancient times and continue to be today with renewed methods. Environmental education requires playing and learning outdoors. The Provincial Council of Girona subsidizes an environmental education program for schools in the territory of Girona. In this paper, we present the evaluation of this program. The evaluation questions have been formulated jointly with the institution that subsidizes the program. Thirty-two evaluation criteria have been defined, grouped into nine areas, arising from the literature review of environmental education evaluation, and have been observed in nine activities, directly in the field. The global results of the chosen sample are presented here. Among the strengths of the program we note the coherence between the objectives of each activity and their implementation, as well as the performance of educators who facilitate the activities. The conceptual contents are strongly present in the activities. Instead, similar to the results of other assessments cited in the paper, critical thinking and action, so necessary for environmental education, are less evident. We believe that the initiative that we have evaluated contributes decisively to outdoor education, making the different biogeographic areas of Girona more accessible to schoolchildren.