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Discourses celebrating Kurt Hahn's practical and intellectual contributions to the field of progressive education are ubiquitous. However, the centrality of sexuality in Hahn's educational aims is often misrecognized in contemporary accounts. The purpose of this paper is to provide an historical and historicized contextualization of Hahn's hypervigilance on young male sexuality as it pertained to his educational aims.

This is an historical analysis of sexuality in Kurt Hahn's educational aims and practices. It draws on Hahn's own writings and speeches, coupled with documents from his students and colleagues, educational historians, German historians and historians of both world wars. The paper is informed by critical theory as well as critical approaches to gender, sexuality and pedagogy.

Contrary to contemporary accounts, Kurt Hahn was neither a liberal nor modernizing progressive educator, nor was he interested in generalized sexual repression. Hahn developed a homophobic pedagogy due to his belief that inside all young males were the latent capacities to either be homosexual or contribute societal value. His political-aristocratic allegiances, desire to identify and educate future ruling classes and fear homosexuality was the death of social value led to the use of adventure as a form of preemptive conversion therapy.

This paper links several historical threads and analyses to provide a unique vantage point for understanding the origins of adventure as pedagogical intervention and Kurt Hahn's aims of education.

The purpose of this study is to explore the role of formal religion in the early years of Outward Bound, a significant outdoor education organisation in Britain, from the 1940s to the 1960s.

This article is based on archival and other documentary research in various archives and libraries, mostly in the United Kingdom.

The article shows that religious “instruction” was a central feature of the outdoor education that Outward Bound provided. The nature and extent of this aspect of the training was a matter of considerable debate within the Outward Bound Trust and was influenced by older traditions of muscular Christianity as well as the specific context of the early post–Second World War period. However, the religious influences at the schools were marginalised by the 1960s; although formal Christian observances did not disappear, the emphasis shifted to the promotion of a vaguer spirituality associated with the idea that “the mountains speak for themselves”.

The article establishes the importance of organised Christianity and formal religious observances in the early years of Outward Bound, a feature which has generally been overlooked in the historical literature. It contributes to wider analyses of outdoor education, religious education and secularisation in the mid-twentieth century.

The article discusses Outward Bound's participation in the human potential movement through its incorporation of T-group practices and the reform language of experiential education in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The article reports on original research conducted using materials from Dartmouth College and other Outward Bound collections from 1957 to 1976. It follows a case study approach to illustrate themes pertaining to Outward Bound's creation and evolution in the United States, and the establishment of experiential education more broadly.

Building on prior research (Freeman, 2011; Millikan, 2006), the present article elaborates on the conditions under which Outward Bound abandoned muscular Christianity in favor of humanistic psychology. Experiential education provided both a set of practices and a reform language that helped Outward Bound expand into the educational mainstream, which also helped to extend self-expressive pedagogies into formal and nonformal settings.

The Dartmouth Outward Bound Center's tenure coincided with and reflected broader cultural changes, from the cold war motif of spiritual warfare, frontier masculinity and national service to the rise of self-expression in education. Future scholars can situate specific curricular initiatives in the context of these paradigms, particularly in outdoor education.

The article draws attention to one of the forms that the human potential movement took in education – experiential education – and the reasons for its adoption. It also reinforces emerging understandings of post-WWII American outdoor education as a product of the cold war and reflective of subsequent changes in the wider culture to a narrower focus on the self.

The introduction sets out the scope of the special issue and suggests areas for further research.

This introductory article sets out the rationale and contents of the special issue of History of Education Review on “Outdoor Education in Historical Perspective”. It briefly summarizes the existing state of research and introduces the six articles that comprise the issue.

The introduction identifies four particular themes that arise from the existing literature and from the diverse contributions to this special issue: transculturality; space and place; religion and spirituality; and personality/personalities.

This special issue contains six original contributions to the study of the history of outdoor education, focussing on different locations in Europe and North America.

The purpose of this paper is to highlight how future teaching in business schools will probably take place in an online (here called 24/7) classroom, where culturally diverse e‐learners around the globe meet. Technologies such as iPhone, iPad and a variety of social media, to mention but a few, give management learners of any age easy 24/7 access to information. Depending on the quality of the materials and the competences and cross‐cultural sensibilities of the teachers and trainers, this information may support the progress of e‐learning in business schools. At the same time, easy online access to knowledge and educational structures is not, in practice, equally available yet across cultures, and this will be documented with comparative cases from the Arab world and African learning communities.

This article contributes to multicultural education by identifying various barriers in the online management classroom. It combines theories from educational and cross‐cultural leadership studies, as well as e‐learning studies.

The outcomes of this analysis show how technical, language and cross‐cultural barriers still hinder particular adult learners to benefit from the “24/7 business school”. It is concluded that by understanding and serving a wide range of culturally diverse e‐learners in business schools, the stewardship role of the business school teacher is key.

The interplay between technical, language and cultural barriers in the online business school is rarely reflected upon. It is the intention of the authors to trigger a broad discussion process by focusing on culturally diverse management learners and by connecting with innovative educational insights across histories and cultures.

Critically examines the basis on which outdoor management development (OMD) is founded. Much of the available literature on the subject is anecdotal and serves only to perpetuate an illusion of management development through activities such as climbing and canoeing in beautiful scenery. Identifies six criteria which represent the necessary constituents of OMD; these are not exclusive to OMD and may be found in other forms of management development, thus refuting the illusion that OMD offers something unique. The criteria provide a template for managers to evaluate the suitability and quality of OMD programmes and thereby enable them to make a cost‐effective choice from the wide range of courses available.

This study examines one social studies teacher’s experience developing and implementing an Experiential Education-based (EE) curriculum and her reflection on the experience of putting theory and research into practice. Using a qualitative case study research strategy, we focused on the single case of the teacher’s experience. We identified four categories related to the implementation of EE elements into her classes: (a) teacher’s values, (b) students’ values, (c) teacher directedness versus student directedness, and (d) accountability. We used the teacher’s values as the central category for our discussion to explore how these values conflicted and coordinated with manifestations of the other categories. Through this study, we learned more about the importance of teachers as researchers and the value of university and school collaboration. However, the critical result was the disconnect between what is valued by the teacher and what is assessed and the need for a continued examination of this issue.

The purpose of this paper is to examine Czech traditions of outdoor games and sports, turistika activities and education in nature programmes, which have continued to develop during periods of oppression and provided opportunities to preserve the Czech culture.

A review of the historical, cultural and political context of education in nature traditions in Czech was proposed.

Late 19th century organisations such as the Turistický klub and Sokol were instrumental in developing a range of indigenous turistika activities involving active movement. The early 20th century influences were the Czech scouting movement, summer camps and Woodcraft. Charles University provided the first tertiary outdoor educational programmes in Prague in the 1950s. Their foundation course “Turistika and Outdoor Sports” is still compulsory for all students studying physical education and sport. Turistika activities and outdoor sports and games continued to be developed throughout the liberalization of the socialist regime in the 1960s.

Following the Prague Spring in 1968, and under the guise of the Socialist Youth Union organization, new experimental forms of outdoor education emerged.

Since the Velvet Revolution in 1989 organisations have reconnected with Czech outdoor traditions that flourished before 1948 and other organisations have developed education in nature programs. The commercial sphere, which did not exist before 1989, has now been established in the outdoor area. However, traditional participation in turistika activities has been impacted by other external motivations as a broader range of opportunities have become available and accepted, and tourism outside of Czech and Europe has become increasingly popular and accessible.

The originality of this paper is to provide an overview of Czech political and cultural history and how it has shaped people's relationship, particularly children and youth, with the outdoors.

The purpose of this case study is to explore the relevance of experiential learning to apprentices in the current commercial and industrial market.

Through exploring the history of The Outward Bound Trust and of experiential learning namely David A Kolb's summary of its relevance in education, Priest and Gass's encouragement for active questioning and the practical application of experiential learning by The Trust on behalf of major companies within the UK, this study aims to encourage and enlighten readers of its benefits. The four elements or phases of the experiential learning cycle: experiencing, reviewing, concluding and planning are explained and explored within this case study. The case study outlines how Airbus and the Volkswagen Group United Kingdom Ltd use apprentice training programmes as effective extensions of their own in‐house training.

Experiential learning has been found to be a cost‐effective extension of in‐house apprentice development programmes with attendees benefiting from an increase in motivation, improvement in self‐awareness and personal responsibility, enhanced team work and improved communications skills. The results of these new and enhanced skills have been found by The Trust's clients to transfer effectively back to the workplace.

This paper is of value and relevance to in‐house or external HR directors who may wish to consider experiential learning programmes for training apprentices.

This monograph looks at the growing use of the outdoors for management development on both sides of the Atlantic. The author suggests the term “Outdoor Development” to describe a systematic use of outdoor activities which incorporate process reviews and the application of experiential learning methods.