Outdoor Education: a Tool for Experiential Learning

Outdoor Education: a Tool for Experiential Learning

By Christian Devine

Saint Michael's College

As the reader, I would like for you to think back all the way to your middle school experience and try to place yourself back into your old shoes. At that point in time, as a young adolescent, I am certain you were in some state of unrest, and this had a lot to do with where you were developmentally. Middle school are the formative years of one’s childhood where they develop changes in their social, cognitive, and physical health, and when all of this happens at once, it can create quite the stressful situation for a young adolescent. According to James Fenwick, middle school is the most crucial period in an individual’s life when it comes to synthesizing a rational, positive, personal value system, something that is crucial as one advances through the next few phases of life.

One aspect of middle school that I believe gets looked over by administrators and school boards in the age of standardized tests is the practice of Outdoor Education for middle grade students. Outdoor education provides educators a way of teaching and learning that embarks on the vision of 21^st century learning, and that is to provide students with meaningful, experiential opportunities, rather than just teaching the content through a certain process. About a century ago, John Dewey emphasized that experiential learning is an essential ingredient in meaningful and comprehensive student learning. I would say that is true considering when I look back at my middle school experience, most of the activities that I can recall were all outside; whether it was a team wide ropes course day, reading aloud under the sun instead of in the classroom, or even if it was our science teacher bringing us out to the parking lot with two metal baseball bats to show that light moves quicker than sound. There are an overwhelming amount of positive benefits of outdoor education for young adolescents, but this list, developed by Hood River Middle School, provides five reasons why they choose to do an outdoor classroom excursion every year.

 5 Benefits of Outdoor Schooling- Observed from Hood River Middle School

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/5-benefits-of-outdoor-education-michael-becker

1.     It Builds Community

2.     It Raises Expectations and Standards

3.     It Increases Connection

4.     It Builds Culture

5.     It Develops Positive Feelings and Memories about schooling and the outdoors

One other benefit of outdoor education that I find particularly intriguing from a study done by Joan James and Theresa Williams in the Journal of Experiential Education  is how valuable the experience is for the students that tend to struggle with traditional school tasks and have developed an apathetic attitude to schooling and learning over the years. It has been shown that these students and students alike are more likely to be leaders of their peers in an experiential setting. This practice alone allows all students to be feel empowered in a school setting, especially when done around their fellow students and in front of their teachers, thus creating empirical benefits for all students as they grow to become citizens of the world. Outdoor education also allows for students who are not particularly familiar with nature to gain a greater understanding and appreciation for nature. This not only enhances the student’s instrumental value for nature, but it also encompasses their intrinsic value for nature, thus developing more environmentally aware students; all through simply allowing opportunities for outdoor education to be a part of a student’s education.

The problems that educators who advocate for outdoor education programs for their students face is distinctive to its own field in one way, but in another way the same problem that all educators face in the age of standardized tests. According to Quay in the work Outdoor Education and School Curriculum Distinctiveness: More than Content, More than Process, the challenge for outdoor education is distinctive because there is not a universal body of knowledge or subject matter for the outdoor education field. If educators worked to develop a broad framework of what an outdoor education program should look like, within the context of the local community, then educational institutions, especially public schools, would be more likely to begin to implement more outdoor, experiential learning opportunities for their students. The true problem lies below curriculum and content and is in fact shared by mostly all educators, and that is the desire to provide students with more experiential learning that brings the material to life. One question that is raised by school officials when it comes to establishing an outdoor education program is how outdoor education will effect schooling outcomes. Outdoor education programs have been seen to enhance personal and group development goals, but none of the studies done yet has proven it directly schooling outcomes. Until outdoor education advocates find creative ways of being outdoors that are measureable in today’s world of standards, I am sure more and more outdoor education programs will arise in order to enhance schooling outcomes.

As a history major and with the hopes of becoming a social studies teacher someday, it will be challenging to find ways to implement my lessons in the outdoors. One article that I came across earlier this year was how one fifth grade teacher at a local elementary school next to my hometown reenacts the American Revolutionary War with his students outside. This teacher has found a method of creating ways of being for students while they study history, which has proven to be beneficial for all students and their learning. He gives students an actual role to play in the American Revolution, thus empowering them to want to find out more about the character they are representing and the relationship their historical figures have with others in the class. The link to the article is attached below.

http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/20170202/brentwood-teacher-brings-american-revolution-to-life

Outdoor education also has the ability to create more environmentally aware students, something that is very important for 21^st century learning as we all move forward in the age of environmental degradation. Through this, it also has the ability to create opportunities for service-learning in the community, whether it’s a beach cleanup day in the spring or constructing a garden.  The following link has ten ideas for outdoor education catered to young adolescents, with all of the activities linked to proven practice. The activities are more designed to cover topics of environmental education, but all of the ideas could be twisted around in some form or another to cover topics in most of the subject areas.

https://www.washcoll.edu/live/files/4270-ten-outdoor-education-activities

 There is no debate that outdoor education produces great personal and group developmental outcomes, but when outdoor education programs are instituted correctly, they find ways to connect the classroom setting to the field and then back into the classroom, thus enhancing educational outcomes for students, as well. Outdoor educators and advocates create ways of being outside of the classroom through the content and process established within the classroom setting. Also seen in the link above, outdoor education provides the opportunity for service learning. Many activities done outdoors can have a huge impact on the communities’ environment, for example cleaning up liter in heavily trashed areas.  This fresh perspective on outdoor education does not put the subject itself in a box, but rather is viewed as a broad program that finds ways to implement classroom content to the outdoors and also providing locally contextualized learning that would be beneficial to a majority of students. In my view, this could be seen as a program that works with classroom teachers on finding engaging opportunities for students, or also a program that provides curricular or extracurricular time dedicated to outdoor education areas that may relate to the community.

The youtube links below are all videos that I found particularly interesting when studying the topic of outdoor education. The first two videos discuss outdoor learning spaces at schools and how to best implement them for learning. The last video is an important TedTalk that I believe all parents and teachers should watch regarding the relationship that young adolescents of today have with the outdoors, and the importance of getting school children outside.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxeWMjwqVzM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edtWYcJuZaI

Get Hooked On Nature

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArhjLa4xbNk

Sources:

Becker, M. (2016, April 19). 5 Benefits of Outdoor Education. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/5-benefits-of-outdoor-education-michael-becker

Quay, J. "Outdoor Education and School Curriculum Distinctiveness: More than Content, More than Process." Journal of Outdoor & Environmental Education 19.2 (2016): 42-50. Eue.

Mcgowan, A. "Impact of One-Semester Outdoor Education Programs on Adolescent Perceptions of Self-Authorship." Journal of Experiential Education 39.4 (2016): 386-411. Eue.

James, J. and Williams, T. "School-Based Experiential Outdoor Education: A Neglected Necessity." Journal of Experiential Education 40.1 (2017): 58-71. Eue

Elena, Moldovan. "The Influence of Outdoor Education Activities on the Young People's Psycho Motile Development. Gymnasium: Scientific Journal of Education, Sports & Health 16 (2015): 137-50. SPORTDiscus with Full Text.

Bricker, Lara. "Brentwood teacher brings American Revolution to life." Seacoastonline.com. Exeter News Letter, 02 Feb. 2017. Web. <http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/20170202/brentwood-teacher-brings-american-revolution-to-life>.

Fenwick, James J. "Insights into the Middle School Years." Educational Leadership. Association for Supervision and Curriculum, Apr. 1977. Web. <http://www.ascd.org/ASCD/pdf/journals/ed_lead/el_197704_fenwick.pdf>.

Family Involvement

As a future educator, it is imperative that I find ways to successfully integrate family involvement for the betterment of my students. Family involvement allows for all students to active and engaged learners both inside and outside of the classroom. As a future educator, establishing a healthy relationships with family and parents of students will only enhance the overall growth of the adolescent. Epstein provides a framework of the six different types of practices of family involvement that helps bridge the gap for students between school, family and the community.



One area of family involvement that I find crucially important is the communication aspect. Communication from school to home can happen through many different mediums. One way for parents to be in communication with families is through a weekly or bi-weekly newsletter, especially in a middle school setting through a "Team Newsletter". This can be sent home via mail, but it could also be sent home with the student, thus empowering the student to deliver news about their school life to their parents. Healthy communication could also be practiced with a follow-up email, to ensure the parents receiving the information about the school, or team. Communication with families also may consist of parent-teacher conferences, which can happen once or twice a year for each student, with follow ups as needed. Communication from school to home allows the student to feel a connection between the two important places of their life and parents can enhance their growth if they are aware of what they are doing in the classroom and at school on a regular basis.

Another area of family involvement that I find important for student growth is collaboration with the community. This can been seen in many different forms, but two way that stick out to me is bringing in family members to help further a content area or assist students students with a possible language barrier between teacher and student. When I was in school, my dad came in to a few of my classes to help further our study of forestry because of his knowledge on the subject. We would go on nature walks throughout the woods with my classes with our teacher and fellow students, with my father leading the way explaining the different types of trees. This is just one personal example, but I feel like this type of family involvement allows for the content to be practical for students and it never hurts for content information to come from another perspective than the teacher that the students listen to on a daily basis. Parents of students share all sorts of knowledge and experience, and its only beneficial for students if teachers and schools allow for opportunities for those parents to come in an find ways to connect content being discussed in the classroom to their real world experiences. Another type of family involvement that is successful through community collaboration is the use of translators for ELL students. Through some classroom observations at Winooski High School, I noticed this type of family or community involvement to be extremely useful for their ELL students. Having translators come in from the community to assist students really allows for students to feel welcomed and have a greater chance of truly excelling in the course. ELL students are just as a capable and English speaking students, but through translators, it really helps them learn the content successfully in a classroom setting

Teaming Reflection

Teaming, the idea of teachers collaborating together to serve the wide-ranging needs of young adolescent students, is what sets the middle grades structure apart from the junior high school system. Traditionally, students of that age group attended and approached their middle years of education just like they would during their high school years, which is now proven to be misappropriate when it comes to fulfilling their needs as human-beings, as well as students. Teaming allows for students to grow more personal relationships with the teachers, which encourages greater student involvement and participation within the team community, as well as the school community. Teaming brings a sense of belonging to student, for they are able to identify with a team and this allows them to be reassured they are a part of something meaningful. When students at this stage in their development feel as though they have a basic sense of acceptance within one particular community, they are more likely to broader their horizons and participate in other activities within the school, as well as making a difference at a young age in their respective communities. This is just one way that teaming can promote life-long learning at a young age. Students in the middle grades structure, when implemented successfully, feel more comfortable to learn and grow independently because of the reassuring sense of community they naturally feel by their peers and teachers when they are interacting within the team community on a daily basis. 

Advisory Reflection

After reading about middle school teaming, it appears the core of this whole practice of the middle grades structure revolves around the integration and implementation of advisory programs, or programs alike. Advisory programs in middle schools not only provide organizational structure for both the teachers and students, but also serves the daily needs of a student. This time period allows for middle school students to interact with adults in more of an informal way, something that is developmentally crucial for students of this age. This time period also gives students a break from the school day, a schedule that can be monotonous to a middle school student. Students also have the opportunity to catch up on work during this period that they may have missed, as well as work on engaging projects. Teachers can find ways to academically reach their students in their advisory by spending so much time with them and work with students to provide meaningful learning experiences in this block of time. This time can allow for social interaction between a close-knit groups of students, and can build a family-like attitude, an idea that will keep middle school students from falling into isolation. What really struck me following the readings was the importance that advisory and other times not in the regular classroom setting has for students in middle school. At first glance, and if not implemented correctly, advisory can only serve for the students’ academic needs, but when implemented properly by the individual teacher, it can meet their social and emotional needs on a daily basis. 

Mandatory Reporting

As a future educator who hopes to work in schools with students, I will be obliged to be a mandatory reporter. This means that it will be an obligation of mine to report any forms of self-harm, sexual abuse, or physical abuse that I am aware of among any of the students I am surrounded by. It will be my job to be cognitive of the behavioral patterns of the students around me and to pick up on any suspect behavior that may hint towards lager issues in the students life. Suicide and self-harm is an issue in many of secondary schools across the country and affects teenagers at all different emotional levels. Sometimes, it may be very difficult to pick up on the signs of depression or thoughts of suicide, but if I hear or sense anything suspicious that may seem harmful to oneself or someone else, it will be my job to reach out to the person I report to and make sure that student gets the proper assistance they may need. Also as a future educator, it is important that I realize my place in the school and in the student's lives. I am there to educate and tend to their needs as a student, and by no means will be qualified to assist as a psychiatrist to them or a mental health expert in general. Although I may feel I am helping them out if I allow them to come talk to me about their problems at home or among friends, the best service I can do them in that regard is point them towards specialists who can actually help them out. I will be supportive of all my students, but sometimes that means pointing them in the right direction and having someone who is qualified to assist that student. Attached is a PDF file filled with information about mandatory reporting, recognizing the signs of abuse, and other aspects that promote teachers keeping their children safe.

Mandatory Reporting and Keeping Youth Safe

https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/fysb/mandatory_reporting_508.pdf

ELL Students Reflecting Aspects of their Culture

Throughout the course of the experience with my ELL placement, I have noticed a few cultural customs of Nepal be reflected through my placements manner. Each time we meet up for tutoring, we exchange greetings and farewells that consist of a firm-proper handshake and S. also gives me a subtle head bow, something that is an integral part to Nepali culture. Younger people in or from Nepal often view anyone older or more mature with great respect, even a westerner like myself. I may be only two years older than S., but due to his cultural background, he naturally treats me with similar respect as he would treat a teacher. Another custom from Nepal that S. still carries with him is their cultural unawareness for punctuality. S. has shown up to our tutoring meetings late each time, but for Nepali standards, he would not necessarily be tardy. Nepali time, in regards to casual appointments, is later than the time mentioned, perhaps maybe even by one to two hours. S.'s teachers informed me that he is often late before I met him, but they also mentioned that he has improved greatly as of late. As a future educator, it is important to take in account students prior cultures and the differences that it may pose to western culture. It is imperative to note that certain cultural aspects are rooted in who they are, and it is up to us educators to still reach these students, even though certain cultural customs may not be parallel with one another.

https://www.roughguides.com/destinations/asia/nepal/culture-and-etiquette/
http://www.everyculture.com/Ma-Ni/Nepal.html

Understanding Identity

For educators, it is absolutely paramount to understand students' backgrounds and their self-identity. Their background is rooted in who they are, and their self-identity is the greatest aspect of who they are. Self-identity can stay the same over time, but for adolescents, it is often ever changing or in the process of being found. As a future educator, I will only be able to reach and engage students if I have the ability to understand where they individually are in their self-identity. Attached is a Venn Diagram comparing some similarities and differences between my identity and my ELL partner's identity.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10rmY_BZGQEYtJjSu0d0ueBGY2GfGG5tl62pcCo71wyQ/edit