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Environmental Education Research

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Educators’ perceptions of bringing

students to environmental
consciousness through engaging
outdoor experiences
a a
Joanne Nazir & Erminia Pedretti
a
Department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning, OISE,
University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
Published online: 26 Jan 2015.

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To cite this article: Joanne Nazir & Erminia Pedretti (2015): Educators’ perceptions of bringing
students to environmental consciousness through engaging outdoor experiences, Environmental
Education Research, DOI: 10.1080/13504622.2014.996208

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 Environmental Education Research, 2015
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2014.996208

Educators’ perceptions of bringing students to environmental

consciousness through engaging outdoor experiences
Joanne Nazir* and Erminia Pedretti

Department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning, OISE, University of Toronto, Toronto,

ON, Canada
(Received 7 August 2014; accepted 3 December 2014)
Downloaded by [Northeastern University] at 12:56 28 February 2015

This paper explores the premise that environmental education involves raising
environmental consciousness rather than simply knowing about the environment
in a technical-rational manner and acting for it in mechanistic prescribed ways.
The paper draws on educational theory and data from a phenomenological case
study of educators working together at an outdoor education centre in urban
Canada, whose practice of environmental education we believe can best be
described as environmental consciousness raising. Based on our study’s findings,
we suggest that raising environmental consciousness involves connecting people
to their environment, fostering care for the environment, and building agency for
the environment. Educating for environmental consciousness also requires
providing people with deeply engaging experiences that afford authenticity,
multidimensionality and serendipity. Our study shows how these features can
work to raise environmental consciousness, by creating epiphanies or moments
when sudden expansions of the self, realization and empowerment become
possible.
Keywords: environmental consciousness; environmental education; outdoor
education

Introduction
For some time now, researchers and practitioners in the field of environmental
education have been recommending a shift away from a focus on cognitive knowing
about the environment towards raising peoples’ environmental consciousness in
deep and substantive ways (see, e.g. Bowers 2009; Gough 1987; Gruenewald 2004;
Kahn 2008; Wals and Dillon 2013). While the term consciousness raising may
connote a shallow appreciation about the environment, i.e. awareness raising, in
more recent literature, this has been changing. Wals and Dillon (2013), for example,
suggest that contemporary constructions of environmental education should focus on
helping transform people from their existing ways of being with a particular focus
on ways that support the long-term sustainable well-being of the Earth in all its full-
ness. In a similar vein, Bai and Romanycia (2013, 105) suggest that environmental
consciousness raising is really about ‘turning ecological ethics into life practice’, or
making ecological principles into habits of mind, body and heart. Both contrast with

*Corresponding author. Email: joanne.nazir@mail.utoronto.ca

© 2015 Taylor & Francis

 2 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

a ‘cognitive knowing’ focus, which is cast largely in technical-rational terms, and

coupled with acting for the environment in mechanistic prescribed ways.
In pedagogical terms, this type of environmental education can be elusive, be
that within the walls of the classroom, or beyond. Kahn (2008), for example, main-
tains that deep mental engagement is the key to environmental learning, linking this
to shifts in consciousness not well serviced by conventional forms of education and
schooling. In this respect, Kahn argues that environmental education should go
beyond prescribing environmental actions and focus instead on encouraging people
to think and experience deeply in both critical and creative ways when dealing with
environmental issues.
Others have also pointed out that a primary focus on the cognitive may not be
enough to raise environmental consciousness. Over a decade ago, Kollmuss and
Agyeman (2002) illustrated a wide range of other factors implicit to environmental
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learning in addition to cognitive ones. Supporting this line of thinking, place-based

educators (e.g. Gruenewald 2004; Sobel 2004) have been explicit in identifying deep
emotions as significant aspects to consider when designing programmes for environ-
mental learning. For them, emotional attachment to place is a necessary aspect of
getting people to work with and for the environment, a conviction underscored by
Wendell Berry in his 2012 Jeffersonian Lecture, saying ‘it [environmental steward-
ship and advocacy] all turns on affection.’
In addition to mental and emotional engagement, ‘body conscious’ researchers
have also raised the notion that other dimensions of engagement exist that environ-
mental education has not paid adequate attention to. Davies (2013), for example,
alludes to the significant embodied physicality of learning which environmental edu-
cation often ignores. Bai and Romanycia (2013) provides examples of how spiritual
exercises like mindfulness, yoga and meditation can work to bring people to the
Buddhist notions of full presence, freedom from an alienated consciousness and
thus, environmental enlightenment. While in a recent paper, Greenwood (2013)
introduces the term ‘place consciousness’ in relation to environmental learning,
describing a pedagogy to foster that which he calls ‘contextual embodied
experience’, which entwines the various threads of engagement described above.
In this paper, we seek to advance the idea that the work of environmental educa-
tion should involve raising environmental consciousness. For us, the term raising
environmental consciousness is a complex construct involving transforming people
in deep multidimensional ways rather than just encouraging shallow talk or simple
awareness about environmental matters. We draw on a phenomenological case study
of educators working together at Faraway Dale Outdoor Education Centre (pseudo-
nym) in urban Canada whose practice of environmental education we believe can
best be described as environmental consciousness raising. While the main question
guiding the original study focused broadly on illuminating Faraway Dale educators’
overall experiences of teaching environmental education in an outdoor context
(Nazir and Pedretti 2014), in this paper, we use those findings to deepen discussion
about the nature, priority and challenges involved in environmental education as a
form of consciousness raising. The specific questions that this paper addresses are:
(i) How do educators’ at Faraway Dale interpret environmental education as con-
sciousness raising? and (ii) What is the nature of pedagogy required for facilitating
consciousness raising?
 Environmental Education Research 3

Theoretical considerations
Literature from the fields of curriculum and educational studies suggest a range of
theories that are in sympathy with environmental education that is less technical-
rational in ideology and less mechanistic in practice. For our study of outdoor edu-
cators, we drew from four strands of theory, which on further reflection, seem to
hold the potential for deepening understandings of what environmental education as
consciousness raising entails, and how to enact it. The strands are: holistic
education, ethics of care, experiential learning and transformative learning.

Holistic education
Holism expresses the idea that the world is a seamless, dynamic, interconnected
whole of which we humans are a part. Holism accepts that humans are multidimen-
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sional beings with physical, mental, emotional and spiritual aspects. Knowledge is
regarded as complex and ultimately integrated. By educating the whole person, the
main goal of an holistic education is to bring students (who often see themselves as
fragmented) to a balanced, connected and inclusive relationship with the world
(Miller 2007) – what some refer to as educating the head, heart and hands (Steiner
1965).
The relationship between holistic education and environmental education has
been explored previously. For example, according to Miller (2007, 1), ‘Nature at its
core is interrelated and dynamic. We see this dynamism and connectedness in the
atom, organic systems, the biospheres and the universe itself.’ Miller goes on to
explain that an aspect of holistic education is to bring students to an awareness of
nature’s wholeness and their place in it, aligning with what some (e.g. Capra 1997;
Devall and Sessions 1985; Naess 1988) refer to as teaching the principles of deep
ecology.

Ethics of care
In 1977, Carol Gilligan disrupted the field of ethics by making the observation that
emotion and intuition, rather than rational reasoning, is often the foundation from
which many people make ethical decisions. Moreover, she boldly proposed that
‘feeling’, rather than being inferior, is an equally valid source of ethics as rationality.
Gilligan’s focus in advocating an ethic of care surfaces the question of deciding
what is best for one’s immediate relational group based on feelings of attachment
and the need to maintain relationships. Noddings (1999, 2002) is one of many schol-
ars who has applied Gilligan’s work to education, positing that care-based education
is fundamentally relational; that is, emphasizing themes of attachment, interdepen-
dence, the connected self and responsiveness to others. Her work in curriculum and
pedagogy suggests a focus on educating the emotions, that is, teaching students to
be competent carers and sensitive cared-fors, so that they can conceptualize prob-
lems in a more comprehensive way, and genuinely seek to find out what is best for
all in a particular situation, rather than doing what may be mechanistically just or
right.
For Noddings, education of the emotions is a necessary precursor, upon which
rationality can be built. Equivalent contentions have been raised about effective
environmental education, in diverse ways, in attempts to apply ethics of care to
 4 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

environmental education (e.g. Fien 2003; Martin 2007; Russell and Bell 2000). For
Fien (2003), incorporating an ethic of care into environmental education provides
students with an opportunity to see and learn to love the Earth as a broadened sense
of self; while for Martin (2007, 62), the application of care to environmental educa-
tion has the potential to allow people to develop personal, emotional relationships
with ‘places, entities and non-human individuals’ as essentially different but intrinsi-
cally valuable. It is important to note that ethics of care as understood by these
authors go beyond building rationally justifiable ‘affection’ or ‘fondness’ for the
environment (the usual formulation found in many environmental education pro-
grammes). They offer the field a different axiological base upon which people can
build different relationships with the environment, including the feminist and eco-
feminist (Russell and Bell 2000). However, despite their often appealing theoretical
constructions, there is little by way of a research literature that shows that work has
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been done on applying ethics of care to environmental education in practical ways.

Experiential learning
Advocates of experiential learning and experiential education add to the complexity
of ideas about the nature of learning as it relates to consciousness raising. While
there is a distinction between the terms in the academic literature, with experiential
education being more philosophically oriented and experiential learning considered
more narrowly as a methodology (see Breunig 2008; Itin 1999), supporters of both
sets of ideas emphasize the importance of personal experience in the process of
learning.
For example, according to Kolb (1984), experiential learning for adults consists
of four processes: concrete experience with phenomena, observation and reflection,
forming of new knowledge and application and testing of new concepts in new situ-
ations. While all four processes are important, for many supporters of experiential
learning, particularly with children and youth, the first, concrete experience with
phenomena remains their focus. Also, over the years, advocates of experiential
learning have added a few caveats to distinguish the nature of educative experience
from superficial experience. Knapp (1992), for example, suggests educative
experiences should involve meaningful, challenging interactions with phenomena in
real-world settings, while Higgins and Nicol (2011) add that experience must
involve multidimensional engagement of the mind, emotions and senses.

Transformative learning
Advocates and theorists of transformative learning (e.g. Mezirow 2000; O’Sullivan
2003) insist that an education is much more than passing along facts and skills.
They emphasize that true learning should bring about deep changes that move
people to new and positive ways of being. According to O’Sullivan (2003, 327),
‘Transformative learning involves experiencing a deep, structural shift in the basic
premises of thought, feelings, and actions. It is a shift of consciousness that dramati-
cally and irreversibly alters our way of being in the world.’ Transformative learning
emphasizes the need for pedagogical strategies that engage people deeply.
Theories of transformative learning have been directly applied to environmental
education. O’Sullivan, one of its key proponents, states that environmental education
‘involves our understanding of ourselves and our self-locations; our relationships
 Environmental Education Research 5

with humans and with the natural world’ (2003, 327). Furthering these ideas, Wals
and Dillon (2013) have proposed that environmental educators need to create less
formal, hybrid spaces for learning and transformation to occur. These spaces blur
distinctions and bridge racial, social and generational gaps in order to allow for mul-
tiple and meaningful interactions to take place among communities of learners and
educators, affording and fostering transformation for all involved in such processes.
While these strands and the aforementioned literature differ in their details, they
share certain underlying premises. They all suggest that human nature is complex,
existential and multidimensional; and that education for consciousness raising needs
to take these facets into account. Holistic education theories emphasize that humans
are multidimensional beings and that education needs to engage all of these aspects.
Care-based theories maintain that education of the emotions is as necessary as edu-
cation of the mind. Experiential learning theories focus on the personal and embod-
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ied dimensions of learning. Transformative learning theories reiterate that education

should be about eliciting deep changes in people and that pedagogy for change is
not easy or superficial. Drawing collectively on all of these suggests that education
for environmental consciousness raising requires a shift in the way educators
conceive people, reality and education.
So what might this type of environmental education look like in practice?

Context: Faraway Dale Outdoor Education Centre

In this next section, we report on one group of educators, whose work with environ-
mental education highlights how such theories inform and help understanding prac-
tices for environmental consciousness raising and the nature of pedagogy required
for it. Our research site was purposively chosen. A preliminary search, carried out
through a web-based search and inquiries with over 50 outdoor education workers,
indicated that Faraway Dale1 is one of the largest outdoor education centres in
Canada with an established reputation of providing high-quality educational
experiences. It is owned and operated by a major provincial school board. Accord-
ing to its parent organization, over 1700 students from 150 schools visit the centre
every year for educational sessions. Based on these criteria, we decided it would be
an appropriate site for our study.
Faraway Dale Outdoor Education Centre is located in a large city in east central
Canada. The facility, which has been used for outdoor educational purposes for over
50 years, consists of 55 hectares of natural green space encompassing meadow, for-
est, marsh and river habitats. It forms part of a natural wildlife corridor that runs
through its home province, and is the habitat of a variety of wild animals including
foxes, racoons, hawks, geese, ducks, other birds, groundhogs, deer, coyotes,
opossums, field mice, insects and fishes.
Faraway Dale is a day centre (as opposed to a residential centre) and serves the
urban and suburban student population within its vicinity. It accommodates a steady
stream of elementary-aged classes on visits throughout the school year. Faraway
Dale has been mandated by its parent school board to provide environmental educa-
tion as part of its educational efforts. However, other than minimal guidelines, it has
been left to the educators at the facility to interpret what this means and develop
appropriate pedagogy to fulfil this mandate. In response, over 50 self-generated
programmes are offered at Faraway Dale. The overarching principle governing
 6 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

programmes is that they should provide cohesive, impactful sequences of outdoor

activities to meet the centre’s purposes, including environmental education.

The study
We used a phenomenological case study methodology (Creswell 2007; van Manen
1997) to illuminate the essence of the environmental education taking place at
Faraway Dale. Using this type of methodology meant that we focused on analysing
the experience of participants (outdoor educators) with environmental education (the
phenomenon) at one site. Three characteristics which a phenomenological case study
methodology offered that were particularly salient to us were: (i) allowing the search
for essences while avoiding scientistic reductionism; (ii) the inclusion of bracketing
(a way of coming to terms with deep seated preconceptions and/or biases about the
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topic) during the research process; and (iii) acceptance of the personal nature of
coming to know. The latter allowed for the inclusion of emotions, thoughts, opinions
and other nonphysical data in the research process (Stewart and Mickunas 1974).
Nine outdoor educators (the full complement of permanent staff) agreed to be
participants in the study. The ages of the participants ranged from mid-thirties to
mid-fifties. At the time of the study all the participants had already worked at least
10 years at the facility. The four men and five women are referred to by the follow-
ing pseudonyms: Bruce, Danny, Keith, Trevor, Carol, Kelly, Nesha, Arlene and
Ellen. This number and range of participants is suitable for a phenomenological
study where the emphasis is on eliciting rich, representative experience rather than a
large number of shallow descriptions (Munhall 2007; Polkinghorne 1989).

Data collection
Data collection took place over five months, during which we visited the centre
regularly on daylong visits, at least twice every week. Data collection consisted of
representing a variety of lived experiences of the participants. Both Polkinghorne
(1989) and van Manen (1997) suggest that experiences of phenomena are often
embedded in direct and indirect sources. Four data sources were used for this study.
It is important to note that the first two strategies were designed to act as primary
data sources, while the latter two were intended to be secondary data sources used
to triangulate the findings gleaned from primary strategies.

Formal semi-structured interviews

Each participant was interviewed twice using two different semi-structured, open-
ended interviews. Interviews ran approximately one to two hours and took place at
the beginning and end of the data collection period. These interviews were designed
to allow participants to share ideas about their understanding of the nature of envi-
ronmental education and past lived experiences (memories) of how it is manifested
in their work.
More specifically, the first interview solicited background/biographical informa-
tion about participants; elicited their beliefs and intuitions regarding the connection
between outdoor education and environmental education; and provided space for
participants to share their experiences with providing environmental education at an
outdoor centre. For the latter, each participant was asked to share three stories of
 Environmental Education Research 7

educational sessions they had conducted, indicative of their experience as an outdoor

environmental educator. The second interview asked participants to share experi-
ences and perspectives about the theories or constructs underpinning their practice
of environmental education. In preparation for both interviews, participants were
provided with guiding questions prior to interviewing so that she/he could reflect on
their responses beforehand.

Field visits
In between the two major interviews, each participant was shadowed three times
during their educational sessions with visiting groups of students. This was done in
a bid to capture the continuing living experiences of educators providing environ-
mental education. Shadowing consisted of one of us (the researchers) taking the role
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of a nonparticipant observer accompanying visiting groups as educators facilitated

them during daylong educational sessions. Field notes were used to record
descriptions of each educational session observed.

Participant journals
Each participant was provided with a personal journal and invited to document
thoughts, memories and insights about their ideas and experiences of outdoor
environmental education. These journals were collected at the end of participants’
second formal semi-structured interview.

Collection of relevant documents and artefacts

As part of their daily practice, educators at Faraway Dale produce a range of supple-
mentary materials such as programme guides, lesson plans, samples of students
work and photographs. During the data collection period, we collected a wide range
of these types of artefacts from the participants.

Data analysis
Data analysis focused on analysing the experiences of educators to determine the
essential structures that characterize environmental education at the centre. Estab-
lished phenomenological data analysis procedures (Collaizzi 1978; Polkinghorne
1989; van Manen 1997) were applied to the data. The specific data analysis steps
included: overall examination of the data; organization of the data into sets; reduc-
tion and transformation of data into coded items; clarification of the essential struc-
tures of the phenomenon; and iterative writing to create summary descriptions of
structures. Lastly, summary descriptions of structures were tied together to depict
the ‘essence’ of environmental education at the centre.
During analyses, we actively tried to ‘think’ and ‘be’ phenomenologic (Munhall
2007). We were particularly wary during analysis of falling into the practice of using
codes and themes in mechanistic or reductionistic ways. We tried to remain flexible
in identifying the phenomenon, while keeping alert for instances of concealment and
reappearance, since according to Munhall (2007, 149) ‘Being phenomenologic is
not only hearing the language and believing something is being revealed that might
be valid, but it is hearing and contemplating what might be concealed in responses.’
 8 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

Being phenomenologic during data analysis was assisted by taking into account the
biases revealed during bracketing (Husserl 1931), and as suggested by van Manen
(1997), keeping our educator personalities to the fore throughout the process.
Bracketing is a self-reflective process that allowed us to dislodge and confront our
biases about the phenomenon being investigated. This took the form of a personal
reflective journal kept by the researchers throughout the research process.

Findings and discussion

In the following section, we describe findings regarding: (i) educators’ interpretation
of EE as consciousness raising; and (ii) educators’ insights into the nature of
pedagogy required for it.
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Educators’ interpretation of environmental education as consciousness raising

From the beginning of the data collection process, it was clear that educators at
Faraway Dale were working from an understanding of environmental education as
environmental consciousness raising. This was indicated in their answers to the
question, ‘What is environmental education?’ posed in the first formal interview.
Consider the following responses to this question:
It’s [environmental education is] about stirring up that sense inside us that says I want
to go outside. I want to be around trees, I want to listen to birds. I want to be by the
stream. It’s about stirring that up. (Danny, Interview 1, 8)
[Being environmentally educated] is when your actions support what you say … that
you walk your talk. It means I am bringing in my mug, not a cup that I am going to
throw away every day. (Nesha, Interview 1, 10)
… to me it’s [environmental education is] about internal changes. It’s not about don’t
pick and pull the branches because we are watching you. It’s about because you feel a
connection for the tree. And then it doesn’t matter where they [students] are. They’re
not going to do it because they care and see the harm they might cause. (Arlene,
Interview 1, 8)
These comments indicate that for educators at Faraway Dale, environmental educa-
tion is ultimately about transforming people by intrinsically motivating a more equi-
table interplay among people and nature, rather than simply passing along
knowledge about the world or bringing about prescribed, extrinsically motivated
actions. As Bruce (Final Interview, 3) bluntly put it, ‘Environmental education is
much more than trying to ram information down somebody’s throat.’
As the research process continued, Faraway Dale educators’ understanding of
environmental education as a form of consciousness raising became clearer to us.
Indeed, we were able to discern three structures of consciousness raising which seem
to guide their work. These are: connecting people to the environment; encouraging
compassionate care for the environment; and building agency for living low con-
sumption life styles. It is important to understand, however, that the identifying
words – connecting, care and agency – when used by outdoor educators, are not
simply labels, nor are they limited to the everyday meanings usually ascribed to
them. Rather, these words represent complex constructs which these educators
ascribe deep meanings to, and enact, through their pedagogical practices. Each of
these structures is expanded upon below.
 Environmental Education Research 9

Connecting
Connecting refers to the formation of a personal, tangible, multidimensional bond
with nature. This bond is positive, natural and comfortable much like the bond that
ties a mother to an unborn child. For educators at Faraway Dale, the negative envi-
ronmental situation we find ourselves in today is greatly a result of the pathological
disconnection of people from nature bought about by modern lifestyles. The
following comments illustrate these understandings of what it means to connect with
nature:
Connection means finding your place. I think it means seeing where you belong. And
that’s not about looking down and going, ‘Here I am and there is everything’. But
standing where you are and going, ‘This is my world. This is the air I breathe. This is
the water I drink.’ And knowing there is a whole world out there that you can live in,
and be, and prosper. And it doesn’t involve money and status. It involves touching,
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and smelling, and looking and feeling in your heart, ‘This is where I belong’. (Keith,
Interview 1, 11)
You can teach about the natural world and how it works but connecting is more than
that. It’s that peace and being within yourself that nature provides in a unique way.
(Trevor, Interview, 1, 12)
What I mean by connecting is recognizing that there is a wind blowing but it is a very
small wind. Or recognizing that a leaf shimmers in a certain way … Being sensitive to
things around you, hearing things differently, feeling it on your skin. That’s connecting
for me. (Danny, Interview 1, 7)
In other words, these comments suggest that connecting requires nurturing (and in
some cases reforming) a holistic relationship with the self and the world.
An example of how connecting with nature is encouraged at Faraway Dale is
through the ‘Hug-a-Tree’ activity. This activity can take place during a hike in a for-
ested area. Students are invited to choose a tree and hug it as part of the process of
getting to know it and/or thanking it for providing us with food. We (the research-
ers) were fortunate to witness it on several field visits with different educators (e.g.
Arlene, Field Visit 1; Trevor, Field Visit 1; Ellen, Field Visit 2). On these occasions,
it was part of the Maple Syrup Program, a special programme that takes place in
spring, designed to take students through the process of how maple syrup is made.
Hug-a-Tree usually occurred somewhere between students being taught how to
identify a maple tree and tapping a tree for sap. Students were simply invited to
identify a maple tree and give it a hug. While some students were initially skeptical
about hugging a tree, on each occasion we saw it take place, those that ended up
doing it seemed pleasantly gladdened to have done so. For us, the activity highlights
the educators’ understanding of environmental education as a more than mental pro-
cess; in this case, the need to physically touch as part of the process of coming to
know. As Trevor offered, ‘In some ways tree-hugging is a bit silly. But at the same
time you’re hugging a tree. It’s intimate and you’re connected to it. You open
yourself up to something when you do that’ (Trevor, Field Visit 1, 3).

Compassionate care
Based on their experiences and responses, it seems that Faraway Dale’s outdoor edu-
cators assume that people are naturally relational and believe part of their job is to
encourage the development of compassionate carers and sensitive cared-fors. In
 10 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

other words, their understanding of care resonates with Nel Noddings (2002) ethic
of compassionate care. Applied to environmental education, they encourage visiting
students to recognize nature as a living Other that sustains human life, and in turn,
respond sensitively and positively to form a caring relationship with ‘Her’.
Care is not only encouraged with respect to the environment, it is also encour-
aged among students and provided to students by educators. Further, educators do
not expect students to rationalize why they should care, it is expected to arise out of
a place of emotion and spirit. In other words, students are encouraged to care for the
environment out of a natural compassionate compulsion rather than via a calculated
valuation of material, economic or political factors. These understandings of care are
evidenced by the following representative statements from participants during the
research process:
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I think it’s important for them [the students] to understand how to care for nature and
the Earth as they would for a family member. (Carol, Interview 1, 10)
Faraway Dale is a place for students to encounter nature face-to-face, brain to brain
and heart to heart so they can connect and build a caring relationship with her. (Arlene,
Journal, 2)
Instead of being scared or disgusted by an animal be curious and interested. Instead of
screaming, ‘Ahhh … Stroke your chin and say, hmm … How interesting!’ (Trevor,
Field Visit 1, 25)
Through the research process, we also came to realize that the notion of
compassionate care may be one of the fundamental ideas about the overall nature of
education that educators in this setting hold. Keith made this clear in explaining his
educational philosophy, ‘We all need to feel like we’re something and that we
are cared for. And that we have the opportunity to have a voice’ (Keith, Interview
1, 10).
Educators at Faraway Dale infuse the notion of care across programmes in sev-
eral ways. At the beginning of each daytrip, students are explicitly introduced to
care as an appropriate stance to adopt toward human and nonhuman others while at
the centre. Another way these educators encourage care is by modelling it them-
selves. With students, they are sensitive, gentle and responsive. Out in the environ-
ment, they are careful not to step on saplings and tree roots, stick to pathways so as
to be as undisruptive as possible, remove bits of garbage they find in the forest and
handle wild animals only if they need to. They also overtly recognize and praise
instances when students demonstrate care.

Agency
The third structure of consciousness raising at Faraway Dale is building agency for
the environment. For these educators, this means transforming learners’ relationship
with the natural world by providing concrete experiences of acting in ways that are
more benign. Building agency for the environment is crucial:
Part of environmental education is learning how to act for the Earth … using what we
need to live and not overusing … or choosing when I buy a new product, I am choos-
ing something that’s not going to have a negative impact on me, my environment or
my community. (Nesha, Interview 1, 10)
 Environmental Education Research 11

Most environmental programs are naked of the fact of how to act for the Earth. Don’t
do this and don’t do that rather than turning it around to show what we should be
doing. (Carol, Interview 1, 12)
Educators’ commitment to agency building is evident in their inclusion of at least
one designated agency building activity with every visiting group to the centre. One
such activity is the ‘Earth Repair Project (ERP)’. In an ERP, depending on the time
of year, students participate in an activity to ameliorate human-caused damage on
Faraway Valley grounds. Opportunities for ERPs are identified by centre staff on a
continuous basis. They can take many forms, for example: restoring pathways,
planting butterfly or medicinal gardens, controlling invasive species and
afforestation.
During data collection, we observed restoring pathways through ‘Woodchipping’
on several occasions (Bruce, Field Visit 2; Danny, Field Visit 2; Ellen, Field Visit 3;
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and Nesha, Field Visit 3). For this activity, students are brought to an eroded path-
way. They are allowed to observe the pathway: the difficulty of walking on it,
exposed tree roots and the loss of soil. The method of resurfacing the path with a
layer of woodchips is demonstrated. Students are then provided with simple equip-
ment and presented with the challenge of resurfacing a given length of pathway. Stu-
dents are then invited to experience the resurfaced pathway, and share their thoughts
and feelings about the activity. According to educators at Faraway Dale, these con-
crete experiences of acting benignly provide a bridge between thought and practice,
scaffolding students in their movement from wanting and thinking about helping the
environment, to feeling empowered to do so, if they are so inclined. It does so by
providing students with a successful experience of working in and with the
environment in positive ways. In Danny’s words:
Having them [the students] do Woodchipping on a path helps them to feel that they are
part of something greater, something beyond themselves. And it teaches them to look
for instances where they can help to take care of the Earth around them (Danny, Field
Visit 2, 2).
Danny’s comment provides another valuable insight that characterizes the work of
Faraway Dale’s educators. Opportunities they provide for environmental learning are
framed within a space of hope rather than despair scenarios that can leave students
feeling hopeless and helpless.

Educators’ insights into the nature of pedagogy required for consciousness

raising
In addition to having a particular understanding of what raising environmental con-
sciousness means, Faraway Dale’s educators also have many ideas about the nature
of the pedagogies for bringing it about. Our study revealed their strong preference
for using strategies that provide people with deeply engaging experiences with and
in the outdoors. According to Bruce (Interview 1, 13),
What we try to do here is provide experiences to engage kids. So we do a quick walk,
we do a bit of a run, we do a snow angel. We talk to a tree, we follow the river … We
catch snowflakes on out tongue. Something will hopefully engage with each student
somewhere along the line.
When asked how they believe engaging outdoor experiences work to raise con-
sciousness, educators offered the insight that such experiences provide participants
 12 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

with ‘memories that stick’ (Nesha, Interview 1, 12), and act in synergistic ways to
create epiphanies or moments when a sudden expansion of the self, realization and
empowerment which one did not have before are possible. As Danny (Interview 1,
9) explained, ‘I am really hoping that their [the students] eyes will open up and
they’ll pop! I want it [the experiences on the daytrip] to take their breath away!’
Trevor was able to provide additional insight into how such experiences work.
According to him, engaging experiences can cause moments of heightened aware-
ness ‘when you’re really present and you see something that you’ve never seen
before because you’re in the moment’ (Trevor, Field Visit 1, 2). In other words, truly
engaging experience afford the conditions for learner transformation to occur, by
providing opportunities for people to connect and begin caring for Others (human
and nonhuman) within their environments.
Our study also yielded further participant insights about the structures that distin-
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guish deeply engaging experiences from common experiences, which harmonize

greatly with our earlier discussion of connection, care and agency, and the theories of
care-based, transformative, experiential and holistic education. These structures
include: authenticity, multidimensionality and serendipity. These are discussed below.

Authenticity
In accordance with many popular theories of experiential education, the educators in
the study maintained that authenticity is an intrinsic feature of engaging experience.
As shown in the following comment, immediacy and directness is often key to this
understanding: ‘You can teach stuff from a book. You can do experiments in a lab.
You can see the effects on the news or whatever … But until you really experience,
you don’t really know’ (Kelly, Interview 1, 12). To clarify, when Kelly uses the
phrase ‘really experience’, she infers participating in concrete activities which are
direct, personal, and occur in the real world; in other words, authentic. These educa-
tors’ commitment to providing authentic experiences is demonstrated by the fact that
all programmes at Faraway Dale involve significant time spent outdoors. Indeed, on
any daytrip at the centre, students spend at least 75% of their time interacting with
the outside world.

Multidimensionality
Faraway Dale educators frequently made comments that underscored multidimen-
sionality as a crucial feature of engaged experience. In this instance, multidimen-
sionality refers to those experiences that involve the senses, emotions, mind and
spirit.
We can know something cognitively, but knowing something cognitively is very differ-
ent from experiencing it. In languages other than English they have two words for
knowing. Like in French they have ‘Je se’ and ‘Je connais’. And what they are getting
at there is that there is knowing from your mind and there’s knowing from experience.
So when I talk about ‘knowing’, it’s that knowing from experience … That’s a whole
different way of knowing that isn’t limited to our brain. There’s a whole emotional
piece and the aspect of experience that imprints on our body. (Arlene, Interview 1, 12)
Experiential education is having all your senses involved in learning. So they’re not
just looking and listening to a film. They’re getting to touch things. They’re getting to
smell things. In some cases we even get them to taste things. (Ellen, Interview 1, 7)
 Environmental Education Research 13

Both Arlene’s and Ellen’s comments suggest that engaging experiences involve the
mind, body and heart in more than cognitive ways. Moreover, during the research
process, it was evident that for Faraway Dale educators, multidimensionality is not
limited only to the physical, but has deeper metaphysical or spiritual dimensions, as
described in theories of holistic education.
From field visits and programme outlines, we saw several attempts at fostering
this metaphysical aspect of environmental education. One example is the activity
‘Being Still in Nature’ (Trevor, Field Visit 1; Arlene, Field Visit 2; Danny, Field
Visit 2). In this activity, students are taken to an impressive natural location, like the
top of a high hill, the bank of a picturesque part of the river or the middle of a
sunny meadow. Once there, they are instructed on how to still themselves. They are
then challenged to pay attention – sense, feel and attune themselves – to the world
around them, for one minute.
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On most occasions that we witnessed this activity, the students were unable to
achieve stillness and the activity broke up after about 15 seconds. But on our first
field visit with Trevor, a hush fell over the group, to the point where all that could
be heard was the sound of the river rolling in front of us, the rush of the wind in the
trees above and the calls of jays in the distance. This lasted nearly a minute and was
only ended by one gregarious student saying, ‘This is the sound of calm’ (Trevor
Field Visit 1, 21). It was clear that something impactful had happened in that min-
ute, because the group remained more focused for the rest of the morning. At the
end of the day, during the final debriefing, several students named it as one of the
most memorable events of the day.

Serendipity
Educators at Faraway Dale indicated the difficulty of fully planning for engaging
experiences. They identified serendipity – unplanned moments that fortuitously
occur during the day – as an element of their pedagogy. In fact, in their opinion, the
best educative experiences anticipate serendipitous elements, allowing students,
among other things, to ‘experience the wonder of nature’ (Trevor, Interview 1, 9)
and allow nature ‘to be the teacher that she naturally is’ (Arlene, Field Visit 1, 3).
Expecting and responding to serendipity requires educators to remain alert in the
field and have the courage to follow unplanned educative opportunities when they
come along. We were fortunate to observe instances like this during several field
sessions we attended. For example, during the first field visit with Danny, we were
walking out of the forest during a hike designed to educate students about a maple
forest ecosystem when we suddenly came upon fresh fox tracks and fresh fox scat
in the snow. Danny stopped the group to point these out and noted that we had just
missed seeing a pair of foxes in the area. A palpable sense of wonder overtook the
group in that moment as the students contemplated the missed opportunity. For the
rest of the morning’s activities, the students actively looked for foxes. They did not
see them, but because they were being quiet and alert, the group was able to get
quite close to a large group of birds at a feeding station.
Later, when Danny was asked if he had planned the activity, he said he had not.
He was hoping for something to happen and this time it had paid off. In his
interpretation, ‘Nature had decided to show that group some things’ (Danny Field
Visit 1, 10).
 14 J. Nazir and E. Pedretti

Conclusion
Research literature increasingly advocates that environmental education should be
more than prescriptive. Environmental education as a form of consciousness raising
is one possibility for how it can become so less. This paper provides insight into the
nature of environmental education as consciousness raising from the perspective of
educators working at one outdoor education facility in Canada. In agreement with
the literature, our study suggests that environmental education as consciousness rais-
ing concerned with transforming people (Wals and Dillon 2013) and turning abstract
ecological principles into life practice (Bai and Romancyia 2013) is indeed a com-
plex process. The study also offers additional insights. Firstly, it suggests that EE as
consciousness raising consists of three structures: connecting people to their environ-
ment; fostering care for the environment; and building agency for the environment.
Secondly, based on the experiences of our study participants, we suggest that envi-
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ronmental education for consciousness raising requires specialized pedagogical strat-

egies. Building on the notions of creating spaces for multiple, meaningful
interactions to take place (Wals and Dillon 2013) and providing contextual embod-
ied experiences (Greenwood 2013), educators from our study suggest providing peo-
ple with deeply engaging outdoor experiences which are authentic and
multidimensional are essential to environmental consciousness raising. They also
suggest that such experiences cannot be fully planned for, but may inherently
include a certain amount of serendipity or unplanned moments that educators need
to be open to. Finally, the study suggests how a strategy of providing deeply, engag-
ing experiences works to bring about learner transformation. Framed in a context of
hope, such experiences create epiphanies or moments when sudden expansions of
the self, realization and empowerment become possible (Denzin 1989). We recog-
nize that not all of these insights are new. For example, the multidimensional aspect
of teaching for consciousness raising has been suggested by others such as Bai and
Romanycia (2013), and Davies (2013). We also remind readers that the claims pre-
sented here are based on a study of one group of outdoor educators and are not rep-
resentative of the experience of all outdoor educators. However, we believe our
work at this outdoor education centre provides another important perspective to the
environmental education discourse and has implications for environmental education
theories, practice and research.
Our findings show that this form of environmental education can return us to
philosophical questions underpinning the discipline, in particular those surrounding
the nature of human being and the nature of the educative process. In many formula-
tions of environmental thought, humans are acknowledged as multidimensional
beings, but for educational purposes, the emphasis remains largely on the mind.
Learning is largely seen as a cognitive-rational process, with associated pedagogy
largely focused on developing the mental faculties of the learner and curriculum
entailing the transmission of prescribed knowledge. Much has been said in these for-
mulations about the need for providing students with the knowledge to change
behaviours (e.g. Hungerford, Peyton and Wilke 1983) and more recently, capacities
and priorities for becoming critical and creative thinkers with respect to environmen-
tal issues (e.g. Kahn 2008). At the same time, much less is said about the role of the
physical body, the emotions and spirit in learning or the notion of learning as trans-
formation. It is here that the work of Faraway Dale’s outdoor educators with envi-
ronmental education is significant. Their focus on consciousness raising challenges
 Environmental Education Research 15

traditional notions of the nature of human being and learning. For these educators,
humans are multidimensional beings with physical, mental, emotional and spiritual
aspects. Moreover, all of these aspects are seen as channels for learning.
If education is a process of learner transformation, then in alignment with holis-
tic, experiential, transformative and care-based theorists (e.g. Kolb 1984; Miller
2007; Noddings 2002; Steiner 1965), educators at Faraway Dale show how learning
can occur through the head, heart, body and spirit, and how pedagogical experiences
might be designed to engage all of these dimensions so that learners are primed for
transformation. However, while notions of ‘more than cognitive learning’ may be
appealing to many educators, it remains marginalized in practice. Proportionally,
there is little rigorous evidence of learning through and for other dimensions in envi-
ronmental education, particularly when so many reports and evaluations of practice
focus on knowledge, attitudes and behaviours. When this is coupled with the over-
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whelming body of evidence supportive of focusing on the cognitive basis of learn-

ing, resistance to notions of environmental education as consciousness raising
become understandable. A challenge for advocates of this interpretation of environ-
mental education, then, is to continue to build, refine and discuss a body of evidence
documenting the efficacies and challenges of alternative modes of learning, and to
argue in more compelling ways for the viability of alternative underpinning
philosophies for environmental education.

Acknowledgement
We are grateful to the staff of Faraway Dale Outdoor Education Centre for so graciously
sharing their time, thoughts and practices with us. Their enthusiasm and passion for environ-
mental education and outdoor education were inspiring. Without them, this research would
not have been possible.

Note
1. Pseudonyms have been used to refer to the facility at which the study took place and the
participants. This is in keeping with the ethics protocol governing the study in which we
agreed to ensure anonymity of the participants and centre.

Notes on contributors
Joanne Nazir is a doctoral graduate of OISE, University of Toronto. Her continuing research
interests are in environmental education, science education and outdoor education.

Erminia Pedretti is a professor of science education at OISE/UT and teaches in pre-service

teacher education and graduate programmes, offering courses in environmental education,
science, technology, society and environment (STSE) and science education in school and
nonschool settings. She has received numerous grants to support her research and graduate
students. Her publications include five books and over forty articles.

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