The Meanings of 'Friluftsliv' in Physical Education Teacher Education

The aim with this article is to contribute knowledge about the meanings of "friluftsliv" in educational practice. This is done by investigating what "friluftsliv" becomes in the ongoing practices of PETE in Sweden and "how" these meanings are established in the studied activities. The empirical material consists of different kinds of material from "friluftsliv" activities in PETE programmes: study guides, field trip plans, students' vlogs from overnight stays outdoors, video recordings from two longer field trips, audio recordings from evening seminars during the field trips and students' written reflections after them. In order to identify meanings of "friluftsliv" and how these are established we used a transactional analysis based on Dewey. Five different ways of what "friluftsliv" becomes in PETE practice were identified in this study. The different meanings reflect the complex picture of contradictions and lack of common ground for the content and motives identified in the outdoor education field. Our study also confirms how the meaning of "friluftsliv" as skills is established by putting up tents, lighting fires, building wind shelters and so on, and how this contributes to a focus on the instrumental values in PETE. On the other hand, our study shows that other meanings of "friluftsliv" are established in the ongoing practice, where more intrinsic values are at stake even if they are often overshadowed in PETE practice. In conclusion the results also point to the potential of "fritluftsliv" in terms of a suggested move away from an activity-based personal and social development discourse in favour of experiences of educating for environmentally sustainable human-nature relations. The challenge is how to make these experiences educational in PETE and how to guide students in transforming experiences in more exclusive "friluftsliv" into pedagogical competence as future teachers using "friluftsliv" for different purposes in school PE.