FIELD-BASED LEARNING
Field Based Learning is an important aspect of modern education that goes beyond traditional classroom teaching. With experiential learning becoming the norm, outdoor education offers a stimulating and engaging way to learn. It provides students with opportunities to experience and interact with the real world, learning resources, natural surroundings, simulators, structures and processes that are not found within the confines of the classroom. Here are some of the reasons why outdoor education is essential for students: 1. Promotes physical activity and dynamism: Outdoor education encourages physical activity, which is essential for maintaining good physical, mental and emotional health. Students who engage in outdoor activities are generally healthier and display overall well-being. It enhances the overall impact of learning involving all the five senses. 2. Provides hands-on learning opportunities: Outdoor education offers students experiences such as nature walks, field trips, industry tours, museum visits, art gallery explorations, and laboratory experiments. These hands-on experiences enable students to explore, discover and learn through multidimensional sensory inputs, which makes learning relatable, lasting and contextual. 3. Utilizes multiple intelligences: The outdoor learning allows students to engage with subtler forms of intelligence that are not typically used within the traditional classroom. For example, students gain a better understanding of the vast space in the cosmos by watching the night sky live, noting the constellations, and identifying stars. Naturalists will learn by building connections of concepts with the natural world, kinesthetic learners will learn by interacting with the subject matter, and musical learners will learn from the rhythm in nature and processes. Human beings are inherently attuned to learning through building relationships, generating ideas, and creating solutions that address real-world issues. 4. Develops problem-solving skills: Outdoor education helps students develop problem-solving skills as they learn to adapt to new environments and situations. Students are encouraged to think creatively and critically to solve challenges that arise during outdoor activities. Adventure camps, mountaineering and hiking activities bring out the best among youth and create opportunities to develop physical, mental, and emotional endurance. Educators should integrate such experiences into the annual academic calendar of schools. 5. Encourages teamwork and collaboration: Outdoor education promotes teamwork and collaboration as students work together to accomplish tasks and overcome challenges. This helps build communication skills and promotes a sense of community while bringing to the fore the leadership attributes of the children. Outdoor education enables learners to experience natural setups to interact, take initiative, step up to lead, offer help, or build dependability. Outdoor education facilitates the development of social skills, effective communication, and the much-desired collaboration skills for sustainable living in the context of SDG 2030. 6. Develops environmental awareness: Outdoor education helps students develop a sense of appreciation and responsibility for the natural world. The natural setting provides opportunities to understand the vastness as well as non-renewability of natural resources. By exploring and learning about the environment, students develop a deeper understanding of the impact of human activities on the planet and the need to take action. Their commitment to sustainable development and the attainment of SDG 2030 gets renewed as a result. 7. Improves mental health: Outdoor education has been shown to improve mental health by reducing stress and anxiety while increasing the release of happy hormone dopamine. Spending time in nature has a calming effect on the mind and can help reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety that are becoming commonplace in today's world. 8. Encourages an interdisciplinary approach: Outdoor education builds an outlook to view learning as an interdisciplinary pursuit rather than a process of gathering knowledge of different subject matters in seclusion for the purpose of writing examinations and thereafter pursuing a profession with the aim of earning money to meet the needs of self and family. 9. Promotes holistic living: Outdoor learning helps institutions and individuals envision the core purpose of human life as "holistic living" rather than investing their life into the pursuit of material oriented limited life goals 10. Vasudhaiv Kutumbkum: Outdoor living helps build connections with the living being and the non- living matter in order to realize the interdependency of all on each other thereby letting the young generation identify their roles and responsibilities rather than counting life through their rights and gains. In conclusion I would like outdoor education to provide numerous benefits for students and adults alike. It encourages physical activity, provides hands-on learning opportunities, builds problem-solving skills, fosters teamwork and collaboration, develops environmental awareness, and improves mental health.
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