A case study of outdoor education practice for secondary school fine arts courses

Outdoor Training (OT) is a learning and teaching activity that uses an integrated approach which encompasses nature, society, and individual environments emphasizing multi-sensory experiences. In Outdoor Training Activities (OTA) it is aimed to increase an individual's physical, emotional, cognitive, social and spiritual level through the usage of open spaces. Within this context, Outdoor Training Activities (OTA) offer applicable learning and teaching alternatives for many different disciplines. Art education is one of these disciplines with similarities in purpose and practice. In this research, it is intended to reveal the results of visual arts practice course realized within Outdoor Training Activities (OTA). For this purpose, learning process has been observed in the context of visual communication, visual criticism and cultural consciousness, as being the basic learning areas of visual arts education. Case study pattern is used within the research carried out by qualitative method. The research was held for six- weeks in the visual arts course with 5th grade students of junior high (secondary) school during the 2015– 2016 academic year and included 21 students in total where eight of them were in focus. In the Research, semi-structured interviews with focus students, external and internal observer area notes, semi-structured forms of the observer, camera records together with researcher &student diary documents were used as tools. Collected through document, observation and interview, all data were analyzed through descriptive analysis. After the data had been analyzed by NVivo program, findings were interpreted and discussed by associating with (body of ) literatüre. Themes obtained within the context of the findings are: visual expression, critical expression and cultural expression. Positive results of the research findings have been found in the level of learning areas. Accordingly, in the context of visual expression; meaningful results have been achieved in developing creative ideas, communication skills, using a knowledge to solve another situation, reaching the goal by mirroring and developing imaginative thinking skills. In the context of critical expression; self-criticism, respect for different views, and significant results have been achieved in terms of providing solution-focused proposal(s). Lastly, in the context of cultural expression, significant achivements have been resulted in terms of gaining museum consciousness, developing positive perception towards visual arts course and developing environmental awareness. It is suggested that the usage of Outdoor Training Activities (OTA) for visual arts course in the framework of these results should be made widespread with support of school programs and environmental factors (teachers, parents, natural area/field). Key Words: Visual arts teaching, Outdoor training activity, Active learning.