resilience & outdoor education. what is resilience?
TRANSCRIPT
Resilience & Outdoor
Education
What is Resilience?
What is Resilience?
Barn’s burnt down…
Now I can see the moon
- Masahide
What is Resilience?
I ask not for good health, but for an alert and discerning mind.
I ask not that things go my way, but that I have perseverance and courage.
I ask not for less responsibility, but for increased strength.
- Master Cheng Yen, Tzu Chi
What is Resilience?
If…you can keep your head about you when all losing theirs…
- Rudyard Kipling
What is Resilience?
Capacity to withstand stressors
What is Resilience?
Ability to “bounce-back” & “recover” from almost anything
What is Resilience?
Tendency to see problems as opportunities.
What is Resilience?
Psychological fitness
What is Resilience?
Broad“comfort zone” &
Flexible“frame of reference”
The Human Story
(or What Has Happened in the 1 to 2 million
Years?)
Somebody has said that man is the missing link between primitive apes and civilized human beings…
We are semi-civilized, capable of cooperation and affection, but needing some sort of transfiguration into a higher form of life.
- Stanley Kubrick
7th Generation Decision Making
We are looking ahead, as is one of the first mandates given to us as chiefs, to make sure [that] every decision we make relates to the welfare & well-being of the 7th generation to come, & that is the basis by which we make decisions in council. We consider: Will this be to the benefit of the seventh generation? This is a guideline.
What Has Happened in the last 150 Years?
ZEITGEIST-> PSYGEIST
Industrialized Culture
What has really changed?
What has really changed?
What has really changed?
What has really changed?
Transportation
In 1900 there were 8,000 cars and 144 miles of paved road in the USA.
Eating & Exercising
We are eating 750 calories per day less than in the 1970s – but we are burning 800 fewer calories per day.
Sedentary Lifestyle
Television occupies about 40% of the free time of American adults.
Obesity
In the last 20 years there has been 2.5 fold increase in the rates of obesity in industrialized countries.
Playing Outside Playing Outside is Under Threatis Under Threat
Recent British research has found that children are
increasingly playing indoors.
6 Declines of Modern Youth(Dr. Kurt Hahn, 1930s)
Fitness Initiative &
enterprise Memory &
imagination Skill & care Self discipline Compassion
Industrialized Youth
~75% students; ~25% unemployed
Issues of concern: Mental Health Physical Fitness Purpose and Hope Job Skills
Can Resilience be Trained?
“Ishi was sure he knew the cause of our discontent. It stemmed from an excessive amount of
indoor time. 'It is not a man's nature to be
too much indoors.”
e.g., indigenous
Rites of Passage
Healthy societies create formative risk-based educational experiences.
Moral Equivalent of War
William James - “The Moral Equivalent of War” (1896)
4 Antidotes of Modern Ills(Dr. Kurt Hahn, 1930s)
Fitness Training Expeditions Projects Rescue Service
-> Duke of Edinburgh, Outward Bound, etc.
What I find so encouraging about this is that all of us—all of us teachers and students of enlightenment—are at this time in history involved in a truly grand experiment. Never have all of the world's "growth technologies" been fully available to a single culture: we have access not only to all of the forms of Western psychotherapy and human potential techniques, we have access to virtually all of the world's great wisdom traditions as well. And we are all now engaged in this "simple yet complex" experiment in how best to balance all of these approaches”
Commitment in the face of challenge produces character.
- John C. Maxwell
John Dewey: Father of Experiential
Education
Teacher as Midwife
Double-Edged SwordDouble-Edged Sword
Kurt Hahn: Outward Bound was a double-edged sword – it cut and it healed
Coping ProcessCoping Process
1. Stressor -> Appraisal
2. Perceived Threat -> Coping
3.Coping:• Emotion-focused• Problem-focused• Support-focused (assisted coping)
Challenge +
Support=
Growth
Resilience can be fostered by Learning to
Handle Risk
And being supported
Resilience Research
Comfort Zone
Learning Zone‘The Edge’
Panic Zone
Comfort Zone
“…One crowded hour of glorious life
Is worth an age without a name."
Thomas Mordant, 18th century
Extreme Sport Research
Brymer (2004) interviewed extreme sportspeople, focusing on base jumpers and big wave surfers.
“when people are in a really happy mood a really nice mood where they're not gonna get upset with anything you know top of the day I feel great today imagine that was like a 2 foot aura around them and you could see everyone's aura a surfer when he gets a barrel I swear the aura would have to be 20 foot around him…
…And the situations I've explained to you I'd have to say they're 30 foot around you …. That's how strong that aura is it will stay with you for as long as you care to remember it”
“I have transcended that background fear of death of the unknown and once you do that then you can become umm more peaceful
more self assured less umm always looking for
something outside of yourself for the answer
”
Outdoor Education Research Summary
Research on 10,000 outdoor education students has found 3 to 4 out of 5 improve in personal & social skills.
15% no
change65%
positivechange
20% negative change
No change
PsychologicalEffects of
Adventure Education
Hattie et al1997
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Psycho-therapy Class - Aff Self-conceptprograms
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All OE OE Adols Adv Thpy Camps
Effective Program
Characteristics
Effective Resilience Program Characteristics1. Physically oriented2. Use school context, but outside school
location3. Residential settings for long duration4. Conducted by therapists or trained
leaders5. Incorporate aims of adolescents, parents
& teachers and include them as targets in the program
Adventure Education Theory
Hattie, et al, 1997 Immediacy of experience Difficult goals Supportive environment Feedback
Quality Adventure Education?
Staff trained in Education and Psychology Longer Programs Unlock Readiness to Change Immediacy of Experience (action-consequence) Difficult, specific goals Supportive group environment ‘Dollops of Feedback’ Reevaluation of Coping Processes
Example Programs
Use the Spectrum of Choice
VoluntarVoluntaryy
ChallengChallenge by e by
ChoiceChoice
Tough Tough Love Love
(Impellin(Impelling)g)
CompulsCompulsoryory
e.g., e.g., Scouts, Scouts, D of ED of E
e.g., e.g., Project Project
AdventuAdventurere
e.g., e.g., Outward Outward BoundBound
e.g., e.g., incarcerincarcer
ated ated youthyouth
Simple Outdoor Education
A backpack, a bit of food, and a plan Students can conduct their own expeditions Simple gear Solo
Environmental Education
Holistic Range of Challenges
EnvironmeEnvironmentalntal
PhysicalPhysical SocialSocial EmotionaEmotionall
Time
Outward Bound Strong research and evaluation of positive effects Gave rise to other well known programs, including
National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS, Project Adventure (PA) and Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound (ELOB)
Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound
10 principles based on Hahn
Whole school philosophy
Play for Peace
Play for Peace operates in regions of conflict (e.g., Ireland, Guatemala, India) to bring children from cultures in conflict together to play games and laugh together
Mittagundi & Wollangara
Outdoor schools built from scratch by students as part of their outdoor experience.
Extended Stay Outdoor Education
Programs
Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Scheme
Aboriginal & Nature Interpretation Programs
Conclusion
Given an uncertain, challenging future, students need to be equipped with physical & psychological fitness
Outdoor education - sound theory, solid evidence, and an adaptable format for enhancing resilience
Trial & evaluate a wider range of experience-based programs
“…without adventure civilisation is in full decay”
- Alfred Whitehead
Adventure educators are needed to guide
society in understanding risk,
safety & psychological resilience.
"The latitude for innovation has never been broader- if only our minds can
stretch to it."- Gary Hamel