The development, pilot, and evaluation of an on-line course titled NRES 410/610 teaching about the environment outdoors /

by Lockman, Karla Lucile.

Wisconsin teachers are required to teach concepts of environmental education in the K-12 curriculum. However, many teachers are hesitant to bring their students outdoors for anything except P.E. and recess, despite the growing research that shows the outdoors is good for children’s health, emotional and mental well-being. Their reluctances come from a lack of teacher training in outdoor environmental education practices and techniques. NRES 410/610 Teaching About the Environment Outdoors (TAEO) is a one-credit, on-line course developed for UW-Stevens Point and the Wisconsin Center for Environmental Education. The goal of this course is to increase participants’ knowledge, skills, and confidence when teaching about the environment in the outdoors. The aim of this research study was to develop, pilot and evaluate TAEO. Development of the course was completed by the researcher with help from various text, online, and personal resources. The pilot ran from July 30-August 26, 2006 with ten K-12 licensed teachers participating. A pretest-posttest evaluation showed that all participants gained knowledge of outdoor environmental education topics as a result of taking the course. Through a series of formative assessments containing both Likert-scale and open-ended questions, the researcher determined the revisions that should be made to the course. Finally, the researcher used openended comments on the summative evaluation to determine that TAEO was perceived as a valuable learning tool by participants. iii