Exploration in outdoor education as a questioning approach to cultivating ecological awareness

Abstract

The concept of exploration is often associated with educational and scholastic proposals, including outdoors, more or less explicitly and according to heterogeneous articulations. The disposition to explore, which is closely linked to life as can be seen from the wide use of the concept in various knowledge’s areas, is particularly associated with children, who are often referred to as explorers or even natural scientists because of their inquiring approach. Such a disposition can be used by adults to observe and understand their actions and to lead them to reflect on their acquisitions. Assuming exploration as a questioning approach also for those who educate can enable meaningful processes to take place for all those involved in the educational experience. In this context, we intend to explore the concept within the literature, particularly international literature, relating to outdoor education, in order to investigate its interpretations and derive recurrences that are useful for bringing out frames of reference, methodological attentions and design suggestions.