« 2026. # 2 (188)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2026. № 2 (188), 386—392

UDK 37.018.4(47+57)”19″

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/

• Received: 11.03.2026
• Accepted: 16.03.2026
• Published:

EXCURSIONS AS A FORM OF EDUCATIONAL AND UPBRINGING WORK IN SOVIET SCHOOLS

HODOVANSKA Oksana

• ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8297-2414
• Candidate of History, Senior research fellow,
• Department of Social Anthropology, Institute of Ethnology
• of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine,
• 15, Svobody Avenue, 79000, Lviv, Ukraine; 
• Associate Professor, Department of History,
• Museum studies and cultural heritage,
• Lviv Polytechnic National University,
• 12, Bandera str., 79013, Lviv, Ukraine,
• Contacts: e-mail: hodovanska@gmail.com 

Abstract. Introduction. The Soviet school shaped the fundamental values and behavioral patterns of youth through a wide range of educational methods and forms. Today, it remains relevant to clarify the role and significance of specific effective forms of the educational process. In this study, the author aims to reveal the pedagogical and educational potential of school excursions by analyzing their content and implementation, using secondary schools in Lviv, Ternopil, and Ivano-Frankivsk regions from the early 1950s to the mid-1980s as examples. The primary sources of the study include both published and unpublished archival documents, as well as oral history narratives of teachers who practiced during the period under review. The methodological framework of the research consists of typological, comparative, and historical-genetic methods, combined with the oral history method. As a form of the educational process, excursions evolved from a visual learning method into a tool for political-ideological indoctrination and the polytechnization of education. The educational reform of the late 1950s, which proclaimed a course toward «strengthening the ties between school and life,» prioritized vocational and industrial excursions. Teachers in Lviv and Vynnyky utilized visits to local industrial enterprises to integrate theoretical knowledge of physics, chemistry, or mechanics into a practical dimension, thereby preparing students for «socially useful labor.» The establishment of a network of regional children’s excursion and tourist stations in 1952 allowed for the systematization of extracurricular local history and tourism activities. Despite strict regulation and the ideological orientation of routes (such as sites of «military glory» or monuments to Lenin), excursion activities left room for pedagogical initiative. The analysis of teacher interviews revealed practices of transmitting alternative meanings and introducing students to national sites of memory under the guise of official Soviet routes. Thus, one can trace the dual nature of the school excursion: on one hand, it served as an instrument for unifying the Soviet worldview; on the other, it provided a space for informal communication that contributed to the preservation of national identity under totalitarian pressure.

Keywords: students and teachers, educational and upbringing work, Soviet school, excursions, oral history.

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