Life Skill Development And Personal Improvement Models Through Outdoor Education Activities In Primary School

Outdoor learning has gained lots of interest on both theoretical and practical basis among teachers from Romania. It is used more and more in all areas of education, especially in the formal educational institutions. Also, it has been proven in several research areas that outdoor education with its belonging activities can develop several competencies, in a more efficient way than any other educational strategies or methods. Also, the 21st Century education, has a wide preoccupation towards the development of more than only key competencies that are given by the European Union, such as transversal competencies and life skills. There have been introduced in the national school curricula, school subjects within the area of new education types, and there has been a stronger emphasis on counselling and personal development subjects in primary schools, elementary schools and also high schools, during which pupils can develop certain skills and competencies that can help them further on, in becoming useful adults and involved members of the society. The present article sets the theoretical frames for the main concepts, such as outdoor education, life skills, transversal competencies, personal development etc. and also the practical methodology that sets the frame for some template models of outdoor educational activities in primary schools, that can be used as tools for all interested teachers regarding this topic. In the last part of the article, there are going to be presented practical models, that are based on outdoor learning activities, that are fundamental in the primary school curricula and it contains. Also, it is important to be mentioned that all approaches presented are made in an interdisciplinary way.