Spatial skills development in outdoor education a comparison between graduate students at the Universities of Malaga (Spain) and Linkoping (Sweden)

Abstract

The learning of geospatial skills is essential as a transversal matter in many disciplines and as
a fundamental skill in lifelong learning. Outdoor Learning offers a perfect scenario to teach
such skills in a more active and efficient way. This paper presents the development of these
issues with a group of postgraduate students from the University of Málaga (Spain) and
Linköping (Sweden) by a set of activities specially created for such a goal. After some
introductory classroom and field-trip sessions, practical activities were carried out in order to
encourage the use of new technologies in geolocation in connection with historical heritage
awareness. At the end of the experience it was conducted an analysis of results from
questionnaires with the participant groups. The content of these questionnaires deals with
important educational issues such as the opinion of students or the skills acquisition after the
experience.