Taking university lessons outdoors brings unique challenges and benefits

Lecturers and researchers are exploring the benefits and hurdles of holding university classes and fieldwork outdoors, a practice that gained fresh attention during the COVID-19 pandemic. Pedro Maria Abreu Ferreira, a biologist at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil, conducts long-term ecological studies at the Pró-Mata Nature Research and Conservation Center in the Serra Gaúchas region. He notes that teaching biology and ecology outside is mandatory to show students what is out there, providing a complete student experience. However, outdoor teaching has obstacles, including transport delays like a broken bus suspension, severe weather such as a polar air mass during a botany trip, and an overwhelming number of mosquitoes and horseflies that once forced the cancellation of a mangrove forest trip.

Pandemic Shift And Practical Hurdles

During the COVID-19 pandemic, universities turned to outdoor learning to reduce virus spread while keeping in-person classes going. Jean-Philippe Ayotte-Beaudet, a science and outdoor-education researcher at the University of Sherbrooke in Canada, helped design outdoor classrooms at the peak of the pandemic. In September 2020, before vaccines arrived and global cases crossed 28 million, chemist Lisa Bonner at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida, taught classes from picnic benches under a canopy with a periodic table poster. She faced challenges like rain, loud downpours, and high humidity that made whiteboards damp with condensation the moment they were brought outside from air-conditioned rooms, forcing her to wheel them out an hour early to adjust to the temperature.

Context

Outdoor learning allows students to observe natural ecosystems firsthand, which is especially vital for subjects like biology and ecology. While educational research has focused heavily on preschool and school-level outdoor learning, higher education is now seeing more formal study, supported by the experiences of institutions that adapted their spaces during recent global health crises.