Resilience & Outdoor Education. What is Resilience?

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?

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