Conclusion: Emerging Trends in Outdoor Environmental Education in the Post-COVID World

This chapter summarizes and critically reflects on the emerging trends discussed in the preceding chapters, tracing the developments in the OEE field that have occurred in response to the changing world. The chapter highlights certain tendencies, such as reviving the importance of place, empowering teachers, students, and other stakeholders to actively plan and conduct OEE, blurring the boundaries between indoor, outdoor, and cyberspace learning and promoting a post-human, non-anthropocentric perspective in OEE. At the same time, the chapter deals with some of the more traditional OEE approaches and their virtues that are still pertinent for the future. The evolution of the OEE field needs to be shaped by a pluralistic discussion of a variety of approaches. This calls for mutual openness and consideration of both theory and practice. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

Introduction

This chapter starts with questions this volume seeks to explore: What is the role of outdoor environmental education in the post-COVID-19 world, which struggles with climate change, rising social polarization, and denialism of scientific evidence in a world we have made and our children will inherit? How should outdoor environmental education evolve to meet the needs of this contemporary world? How can it learn from its tradition about what to keep and what to change? This chapter introduces the three sections that comprise this book. It highlights each chapter's central theme and connects it with the whole picture. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.

The GLOBE Pulchra Program: Blurring the Boundaries Between Indoor and Outdoor, Science and Society, and Onsite and Online in the COVID World

This chapter presents an overview of students' and teachers' experience with the international citizenship inquiry-based GLOBE Pulchra Program, which was evaluated on a sample of Czech secondary schools. The Program linked students' inquiry into sustainability issues in their community with a follow-up action to remedy the issue of their choice. As the Program was conducted during the COVID pandemic, students learned in multiple learning environments: in person at school, outdoors when investigating local issues, and through virtual applications during lockdown. This experience coincided with the Program's goal to promote a participative approach toward students. As a result, both students and teachers learned to navigate the teaching-learning process in a new context and in new ways. This chapter discusses the relevance of this experience for the post-COVID world. At the same time, it critically reflects on some of the issues that emerged in the Program, especially issues connected with students' limited participation in decision making at some of the involved schools. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.