An authentic learning design for farm tours

Taking students out into the field to visit properties has been a foundation of agricultural education practice in Australian higher education. These excursions are invariably popular with students, but their enjoyment of these activities may be largely due to factors other than the achievement of learning outcomes. This paper reports on a constructivist learning design used for a farm tour whereby strategies were deliberately planned and employed to challenge students to develop their observational skills in an authentic context. Students needed to utilise their prior learning in the area and engage with each other to devise and present proposals to both academic staff and industry cooperators while on the tour.