Instrumentation

After working in the industry for many years, ten of which as a further education teacher I have been judged as a practitioner against criteria and the effectiveness of my programmes. Like many occupations, education is target driven wanting retention, attendance and achievement to be measured and documented. Cullingford (1999) indicates the impacts of such targets that are driven by external influences and not always improving effectiveness.

However, most of my proudest moments in those ten years were the development of individuals, their self belief, confidence and maturity. These attributes are hard to measure and something that the authorities or managers within the education sector were not truly interested in.

There is a belief that proof of our worth in the outdoor industry needs to be credible and documented. Hattie et al (1997) promotes the need for such evidence. Davidson (2009) supports the need for additional qualitative research, as new and substantial evidence on lifelong learning is emerging.

I understand the need and argument in measuring such outcomes. Neill (2003) Life Effectiveness Questionnaire is aimed at establishing, outcomes and benefits and could prove useful to credit both the outdoor industry and participants. However, being able to demonstrate and promote such credible research may even have a damaging effect on adventure education. This could cause managers and facilitators to follow stringent, costly and lengthy processes to gain outcomes to be measured.

Attarian (2002) states there is greater accountability being put on providers. In the current economic climate outdoor establishments are being squeezed and pressured to show their worth. I think back to my teaching days and stand firm on the immeasurable benefits of outdoor education.

If we have to demonstrate such worth, then maybe the bureaucrats and purse string holders need to visit and through direct observation see how and why adventure education is so unique and valuable.

References

Attarian, A (2002).  Trends in outdoor adventure education: North Carolina State University.

Cullingford, C (1999). An Inspector calls: Routledge.

Davidson, L (2009). Qualitative Research and Making Meaning of Adventure: a Case Study of Boys' Experiences of Outdoor Education at School: University of Wellington.

Hattie, J., Marsh, H. W., Neill, J. T., & Richards, G. E. (1997. Adventure education and Outward Bound: Out-of-class experiences that make a lasting difference. Review of Educational Research

Neill, J. T., Marsh, H. W., & Richards, G. E. (2003). The Life Effectiveness Questionnaire: Development and psychometrics. Sydney: University of Western Sydney.

Theories & Concepts

Self worth is such an important and powerful concept in everyone’s lives.  Branden (1971) states the importance of self esteem for our psychological health and wellbeing. 

According to Hattie et al (1997) self esteem outcomes on outdoor education courses exceeded all other education programmes.  Other research does challenge this belief. Burton (1981) reviewed a large number of studies and concluded that there was a balance between positive outcomes and negative outcomes from the outdoor programmes.  It is also fair to mention that Hattie’s research was based on lengthy courses in Australia; in the UK we very seldom run such long programmes.  However Hattie’s substantial and overwhelming research needs to be considered and taken into account when designing and delivering outdoor programmes.

Theory towards practice

Being involved in designing, managing and facilitating programmes for many years, I now feel that after the related readings I may have over engineered such programmes and almost ensured success and manufactured outcomes.  Kimbal and Bacon (1993) state many outdoor programmes are structured and focused towards success.

So what if we allow a much more open approach to optimising self esteem in our programmes?

As facilitators we need to be able to be intuitive towards individuals and have many avenues to go down to ensure we are not gambling and exposing our clients to such demanding conditions that we destroy their self esteem.  Our clients are already in a dilemma, taking a leap in enhancing their self worth but at the same time they could easily fail and have drastic effects on their self esteem.

Moving towards a more synergy task rather than a competition would be suitable. Hopkins and Putnam (1993) identified that matching students to an activity that suits them would work well.

We need to develop our understanding of the triggers and the mechanisms that individuals put in place for protection. Thompson (1993) characterised self worth protection and its implications by making excuses to deny low ability levels.

Every day when coaching I observe these traits and actions taking place.  Covington and Omelich (1991) recognised that some individuals have a defence so strong to protect themselves from failure; they will not even take part.

Ensuring that our participants understand the importance of failure and how this can be used to their advantage is an important and hard concept to introduce and manage.

Another aspect to consider is how we as facilitators evaluate the effectiveness of our programmes.  I am sceptical that asking clients at the end of a programme has much validity or reliability. 

Conrad and Hedin (1981) promoted the importance of understanding of what enhances self esteem, they outlined the use of others in building self esteem. They stated that developing relationships with others improved both personal and social development.

Maybe as facilitators this information can be useful in promoting an individual’s self esteem.  By identifying our clients significant others, we can develop relationships and use this within our reviews and reflection stages to optimise enhancement in their self esteem.

References

Branden, N (1971). The psychology of self esteem: Bantham Books.

Burton, L. M. (1981). A critical analysis and review of the research on Outward

Bound and related programs: University of New Jersey.

Conrad, D., & Hedin, D. (1981). National assessment of experiential education: Summary and implications. Journal of Experiential Education.

Covington, M and Omelich, C. (1979). The Double-Edged Sword in School Achievement: Journal of Educational Psychology, 71

Hattie, J., Marsh, H. W., Neill, J. T., & Richards, G. E. (1997). Out-of-class experiences that make a lasting difference Review of Educational Research 67.

Hopkins, D., & Putnam, R. (1993). Personal growth through adventure. London, England: David Fulton Publishers.

Kimball, R. O., & Bacon, S. B. (1993). The wilderness challenge model. In M. A. Gass (Ed.), Adventure therapy: Therapeutic applications of adventure programming (pp. 11-41). Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing

 Thompson, T. (1993). Characteristics of self worth protection in achievement behaviour: British Journal of Educational Psychology Vol 63.

Experimental education

Luckner and Nadler (1997) state that experimental learning as an approach to education has grown in popularity over the past 20 years. They also claim it is the most effective way of promoting self discovery and provides the foundation for most adventure education programs. Whereas Beames (2010) states that these claims of people learning best through experiences rest on assumptions.

Experimental education and it use in promoting learning is clearly supported by various research and theorists (Dewey, 1938 and Kolb 1984). The Kolb cycle is a well established and widely used model incorporating four stages.

For several years I was actively involved and headed up several programs for the Prince’s Trust. These courses were created for participants to be challenged, exposed to new experiences, reflect as groups and individuals and generalise to a degree.  Hopkins and Putman (1993) state all education is composed of experiences, some experiences however are more experimental than others.

Wattchow & Johnson (2004) state that participants compartmentalise these experiences and no link to everyday life is ever established, without generalisations the move to application becomes very difficult.

During the programs I was involved with the main focus was providing experiences and reflection, however generalisation and application was overlooked.  This meant that the experimental process came to an abrupt end and as facilitators we failed to provide our participants with the tools and understanding to take these experiences into everyday life.

My learning’s from this research is that the programmes I design in the future really need an element of follow up to ensure that the generalisations made on the program are implemented and applied in their workplace and life.  These applications are then experienced again to reinforce and confirm the learning. Also the selection of facilitators involved within my programs will have to have life experience and be intuitive to allow programmes to be flexible thus allowing individual pathways.

Although we cannot dictate what is learnt we can create situations in which learning is likely to occur. Bateson (1980) explains that we do not automatically learn from our experiences and the importance of facilitators is to ensure that the experiences provided can then be made sense of and have meaning to everyday life.

References:

Bateson, G (1979) Mind & Nature: New York, Dutton.

Beames, S (2010) Understanding educational experiences: Sense Publishers.

Hopkins, D & Putman, R (1993) Personal growth through adventure: David Fulton Publishers.

Luckner, J & Nadler, R (1997) Processing the experience: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company.

Wattchow, B & Johnson, D (2004) Students perspective of Camp Mallana outdoor experiences: International Outdoor Education, Australia.

Soft Skills Facilitation - Comfort Zones

Browns (2008) research provides a refreshing look at the well established model used within the outdoor industry.  This has made me question and to some extent caused me intellectual vertigo.

The main point of the research is that pushing outside our relative comfort zone does not create a suitable platform for learning or change to take place.  This is backed up by other research such as Davis – Berman & Berman (2002) and Vella (2002) who both comment on the need for people to feel safe, have trust and accepted for effective learning to take place.

More recent research also supports this such as Plumber (2009) states the need for familiarity and comfort for personal growth and Joseph O’Connor & Andrea Lages (2004) emphasis on the need for trust in a coaching relationship.

As practitioners we need to consider these findings but at the same time understand that our programmes and approach need to be created and developed around individuals.  This humanistic approach centres on personal goals and aspirations.  Within a group this can be diverse and there is a need for the facilitator to take this into consideration.

Within my area of delivery, clients want to be taken into what is perceived to be of a higher risk area, this type of exposure is necessary for some individuals.

Wriesberg (1994) examines optimal arousal levels and the need to take into account three factors, the person, task and environment.  Optimal levels are individually unique and some performers require this to be high whilst others low.

The important factor is that all individuals have specific ways they prefer to learn and develop. The need for us as practitioners is to recognise this and create suitable programmes based around individuals.  Maybe as outlined in Browns (2008) research we need to avoid front loading and feeding the individual with comfort zone concepts and use this model at the end to promote understanding and acceptance.

References:

Brown, M (2008) Comfort zones: Australian Journal of Outdoor Education.

Davis-Berman, J., & Berman, D. (2002) Risk and anxiety in adventure programming: Journal of Experiential Education.

O’Connor, J &  Lages, A (2004) Coaching with NLP: Harper Collins Publishers Limited.

Plummer, R (2009) Outdoor Recreation: An Introduction: Routledge.

Schmidt, R & Wriesberg, C (1994) Motor Learning & Performance: Human Kinetics.

Vella, J. (2002). Learning to listen, learning to teach: Jossey-Bass.