Te Waiora - Ngā Tau 0-10
The final Te Waiora curriculum presents wellbeing as including taha taiao, with outdoor experiences and kaitiakitanga as part of Māori-medium learning.
Research, reports and guidance on education outside the classroom and outdoor education, with a plain-English summary of each and a link to the original. New items are added every week.
The library began with Education Outside the Classroom: Applied Research Readings 2010–2017(McNatty & Boyes, University of Otago, 2017). Later items were found, summarised and checked with AI assistance using the same method: every reference is checked against the publisher's record, every summary against the published abstract, and only items rated high confidence by two independent relevance checks are published. Summaries are a guide: read the original before citing it.
Research library
14 items
Outdoor school-based nature education programs improve social life and vitality: evidence from a six-wave longitudinal study on Italian secondary school students
In a study of 203 Italian students, outdoor programme participation was linked to early gains in social identity and civic engagement, but later effects were inconsistent.
Place, identity, and adaptation: conceptual insights from elementary science education initiatives in rural Hawaiʻi, Maine, and Montana
A three-year professional learning programme in three rural regions shows teachers moving from adapting given units to designing their own place-based units.
Personal health impacts of adventurous outdoor learning
This open-access analysis proposes physiological and neurological pathways through which adventurous outdoor learning may affect stress, mood and cognition.
Health and Physical Education consultation feedback analysis
The Ministry's longer analysis of consultation feedback includes a section on Outdoor Education in the draft HPE curriculum.
What you told us and how we responded: Health and Physical Education consultation response
From 786 submissions, the Ministry says it broadened Outdoor Education in the final HPE curriculum beyond a narrow safety focus.
Students' positive, negative and ambivalent outdoor experiences
Among 419 Hungarian students, nearly 55 per cent linked school nature experiences with too much discipline or too little free time, so going outdoors is not always a positive experience.
Green spaces do not automatically transform teaching
In three newly greened Paris primary schools, teachers often moved usual lessons outside without engaging with the place itself.
Learning that lingers
Young women who did a compulsory 28-day school outdoor programme still recognised enduring learning years later, and some recalled significant difficulty.
A framework of facilitator pedagogical typologies in place-responsive, unregulated Australian nature play programmes
Eight Australian case studies describe three facilitator styles in nature play: nature pedagogues, nature guides and nature players.
Outdoor education and sustained student wellbeing: a scoping review
A review of 20 studies found 80 per cent reported positive wellbeing outcomes from outdoor education, sometimes lasting months or years.
Outdoor environments in school physical education: a scoping review
Research on outdoor PE mostly measures physical activity, and the line between outdoor PE and outdoor education is conceptually blurred.
Development and validation of the School Contexts of Outdoor Learning (SCOOL) scale
An 18-item scale measures barriers and enablers of outdoor learning at teacher, school and education-system level.
Expanding curricular outdoor learning: teacher-identified current practice, barriers and enablers
Expanding outdoor learning depends on school leadership, time, space and support as well as individual teacher skill.