Outdoor Education and Teachers’ Subjective Well-Being : A correlational study on the well-being of Dutch primary school teachers and the use of outdoor education

Sammanfattning: The present study among Dutch primary school teachers investigated the difference in teachers' subjective well-being (SWB) between teachers that used outdoor education (OE) and their peers. The influence of the duration and frequency of outdoor lessons has also been explored. A similar study showed that outdoor educators had a higher SWB. In contrast, other studies mentioned that outdoor educators experienced a high workload or curriculum pressure, which indicated a lower SWB. In this study, SWB consisted of life evaluation, affect, and eudaimonia, and was measured with a questionnaire. A total of 86 respondents have been included in this study, of whom twenty were considered outdoor educators. The respondents were selected through cluster and volunteer sampling. The results showed that using OE was positively correlated with teachers’ overall SWB. This relation remained after controlling for the influence of nature relatedness, and personal characteristics. There was also a positive correlation with all subscales of life evaluation, and most subscales of affect. Anxiety, teacher efficacy, and overall eudaimonia were not correlated with the use of OE. Teachers’ SWB did not vary based on the duration of outdoor lessons and the total amount of time spent annually on OE. However, the frequency of OE was positively correlated with teachers’ SWB. More research is needed to explore the direction of these relations. This would show whether OE leads to a higher SWB or vice versa. Additionally, future research could examine if there is a difference in SWB between the various roles of place in OE.