Facilitator, Teacher, or Leader? Managing Conflicting Roles in Outdoor Education

Abstract

A facilitator is commonly defined as a substantively neutral person who manages the group process in order to help groups achieve identified goals or purposes. However, outdoor educators rarely experience the luxury of only managing the group process, because they are typically responsible for the provision of leadership, skill instruction, and safety management. Based on personal experience, the literature on facilitation, and my research on the theories and practices of facilitator educators providing facilitation training courses in Australia and New Zealand, I recommend strategies for managing the potentially conflicting facilitation roles that outdoor educators may be required to fulfill. The five facilitator roles identified by Schwarz (2002), which serve as a theoretical framework for this paper, are facilitator, facilitative leader, facilitative trainer, facilitative consultant, and facilitative coach. The similarities and differences between these roles are discussed, as are strategies that outdoor educators can apply to optimise their use of, and movement between, these roles.

Outdoor education camp and group cohesion: an investigation in the teacher education institute of Malaysia

“…The influence of gender in the present study was in line with Digby's [51] review of gender differences in outdoor education attitudes and behaviours. They found that women were having stronger group cohesion than men.…”

Falling into LINE: school strategies for overcoming challenges associated with learning in natural environments (LINE)

“…Alongside the breadth of positive impacts evidenced for outdoor learning, a number of challenges to initiating and/or embedding such practices have been reported. These challenges are commonly situated within the context of adventure activity; for example, identifying links to educational objectives (Lugg, 2004), determining the most effective and potentially conflicting roles of outdoor educators (Thomas, 2010), and responding to risk, health and safety concerns (Ogilvie, 2012). Several studies have, however, considered challenges to outdoor learning practices within school and local green spaces (Dillon and Dickie, 2012;Dyment, 2005); the latter of these studies set within the context of Canadian schools involved in school-ground greening.…”

Fen Bilimleri Öğretmenlerinin Gezi Düzenlemeye İlişkin Öz-Yeterlilik İnançlarının İncelenmesi

“…Bu farklılık mesleki deneyimi yüksek olan öğretmenlerin lehinedir. Benzer bir araştırmada, Thomas (2010), deneyimli öğretmenlerin gezi düzenleyebilme aktivitelerinde öğrenci gruplarını yönetmekte zorluk yaşamadığını, ancak mesleki deneyimi az olan deneyimsiz öğretmenlerin gezi düzenleme esnasında bilgi ve deneyim eksikliği nedeniyle güçlük çektiklerini belirtmiştir. Bu bağlamda, mesleki deneyimi yüksek olan öğretmenler meslek hayatları boyunca yaşadıkları deneyim sayesinde gezi düzenleyebilmeye yönelik inançları da olumlu yönde etkilenmiş olabilir.…”

“…Çetin, Kuş ve Karatekin (2010) çalışmasında, öğretmenlerin gezi düzenlemeye yönelik bilgilerinin eksik olduğu, bu konularda bilinçlendirilmesi gerektiği belirtilmiştir. Çünkü öğretmenler her ne kadar gezilere katılsalar da, geziyi koordine etmekte çok az pedagojik bilgi ve deneyime sahiptirler (Tal ve Morag, 2009;Thomas, 2010). Bu bağlamda lisans öğretmenlerinin gezi düzenlemeye ilişkin yetersiz bilgi ve deneyime sahip olması onların geziye yönelik öz-yeterliliklerinin düşük olmasının nedenleri arasında sayılabilir.…”