Viajes lúdicos de fin de semana en familia¿una práctica educativa de adultos?

Abstract

This thesis is organized in five parts. The theoretical part, which includes several foundational chapters related to the relational nature of trips (Ch. 1), the disciplinary fields that provide pedagogical support (adult education, leisure and free time education, etc.) to educationally oriented trips and thus experienced by the adults on them (Ch. 2) and, ultimately, by trying to identify the educational nature of the practices involved in these trips (Ch. 3). This is followed by the second part, the empirical framework, where the design of the project and the methodology followed in the process of data collection is formulated (Ch. 4), the results and their interpretation (Ch. 5), as well as the discussion of these issues that are raised (Ch. 6). The third part focuses on conclusions and suggestions that address the issue of the hypothesis, limitations and future proposals. The fourth part is devoted to the bibliographical references, and the fifth part to the annexes. The current socio-cultural context, immersed in the era of the information society and the knowledge society, of speed and travels in a world that has become smaller, is the propitious scenario to justify this exploration that wishes to contribute to the field of knowledge related to the social education of adults. In order to do so, with reference to adult education, we wanted to limit our horizon to the investigation of a very frequent and at the same time common practice, carried out in free or leisure time by different protagonists, among whom are the elderly, participating in what we have called ‘Viajes Lúdicos de Fin de Semana en Familia’. With this theoretical-practical study, we are committed to gaining a rigorous and solid knowledge of a way of investing the free and leisure time of adults in order to improve their own individual cultural level. It must be said that we have been motivated by the educational character that this recreational, planned leisure and essentially social practice has or can have. Our empirical work has focused on studying whether the regular practice of ‘Viajes Lúdicos de Fin de Semana en Familia’ can have an educational effect for their participants, adults who take them throughout the different ages of their lives, from the first adult years to their decline. O this end, we have implemented an empirical-analytical study of the hypothetical presence of the defining aspects of any educational intervention, on which we have previously theorised. The empirical work has consisted of exploratory research, which has required studies with a mixed approach, the results of which have had a descriptive scope limited to the Spanish context and limited by the origin and size of the sample. Consequently, the findings have been considered relatively generalisable to the eastern half of the Spanish peninsular. The sample was collected by means of two specially designed parallel questionnaires, one to collect the opinions of the participants in the ‘Viajes Lúdicos de Fin de Semana en Familia’ and the other to collect the opinions of the coordinators and facilitators of the activities of these expeditions. The sample size consisted of 233 questionnaires, answered by participants, and 12 questionnaires, answered by coordinators and facilitators. The researcher's observations, recreated in the form of field notes, were also analysed and allowed for a better concreteness during the interpretative analyses. After interpreting the results and processing the extensive information provided by the fieldwork, we can conclude that there is an educational use of family leisure trips, although important shortcomings have been detected in the pedagogical rigour required by educational practices. The opportunities uncovered for further research have proved to be ample, so that the continuation of the line of research and contributing action with lifelong learning explored is considered assured.