The purpose of this study was to examine the social benefits whitewater paddlers derive from a city whitewater park. Many communities are investing great sums of time and money in the development of whitewater parks, with the expectation that these parks will generate social benefits for park users and their surrounding communities (Moorman et…

A robust emergence of outdoor nature-based play areas in several European, Australian, Asian countries, as well as North America Canadian provinces, has occurred recently. This study explored the rationale for and construction of different play zones and affordances for children at a United States Central Kentucky local arboretum and research…

This study aims to determine the demands and tendencies of individuals using recreational areas and parks in the central districts of Ankara. Individuals using recreational areas were given a questionnaire and asked to complete it on a voluntary basis. The findings were evaluated and interpreted according to the sub-dimensions of the scale.

Adult environment literacy in the USA remains disturbingly low, despite the urgency of environmental problems. In the face of federal attack on many of the gains made in the last half a century to protect and sustain natural resources and human health, increasing understanding of complex ecological processes and the human role in environmental…

Purpose: The System for Observing Play and Recreation in Communities (SOPARC) is a valid, reliable method for understanding how people engage in physical activity (PA) in various permanent settings (e.g., parks) and contexts. However, its utility, reliability, and validity in temporary spaces has not been examined. Temporary spaces can provide PA…

Out-of-class learning environments are important learning environments because they improve students' mental and physical health as well as providing them with cognitive, affective, and psychomotor skills. However, it is necessary to make a plan, implement and evaluate the teaching processes appropriately to efficient benefit from out-of-class…

The National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) has long recognized that collaboration among institutions is important to honors education. In addition to its annual NCHC conferences, which offer a large forum for sharing ideas, NCHC has fostered and supported a variety of collaborative programs such as Honors Semesters and Faculty Institutes, the…

In this study, we explored the structure of pupils' creativity in primary education following the Amusement Park Theory, by investigating undiscovered linkages between the domains of writing, mathematics, and drawing. More specifically, we examined: (a) whether some domains and general thematic areas are more closely related to each other than to…

Mountain biking is currently one of the fastest growing recreational activities in the world (Outdoor Foundation, 2013), but documenting the benefits has been challenging. The Benefits of Hiking Scale (BHS), a 38-item instrument assessing the values and benefits of using trails, has been used in national and state park trail research (Freidt,…

Conservation education can be fostered through formal and informal learning. An increasing number of zoological facilities with conservation missions have provided experiential learning venues characterized by self-directed, self-motivated and diversified learning experience integrated with fun and entertainment. In this paper, we develop an…

This project provided baseline risk communication practices to the Canadian Wildlife Service (CWS) for its consideration in developing new policies and management direction for outdoor recreation. This essay provides a summary of the project with a discussion of the practice recommendations. The CWS manages 54 National Wildlife Areas and 92…

The study of Disney is not new to higher education. For decades, Walt Disney has been studied in history courses. The Disney version of customer service excellence has been touted as a best practice in business courses, and film/media courses have analyzed Disney's animated classics (Duncan 2012, Wantasen n.d.). In U.S. higher education, there has…

To address the question of how people design safe amusement park rides, Bill Robertson focuses on the factors designers must consider so that human bodies don't experience too large an acceleration (any change in speed and/or direction) or "g-force" (the acceleration an object undergoes while freely falling, with no air resistance, under…

This review begins from a premise of Disney as a cultural curriculum. After a brief history of Disney studies, tracing the cultural analysis of Disney through the twentieth century, and drawing upon several recent literature reviews of Disney scholarship, the authors survey some of the most notable work produced in the last 10 years. They describe…

Organizational development is based in part on knowledge development, both formal, scientifically proven and also nonscientific practice wisdom. This article brings together all of the lessons learned over our six years of work with Saint Paul Parks and Recreation, and suggests the practice utility of these.