Purposeful Outdoor Learning Empowers Children to Deal with School Transitions

Moving into secondary education is a significant adjustment for young people both socially and academically. Levels of motivation, psycho-social well-being and subsequent academic attainment can be impacted as a result of school transitions. Risk factors associated with transition vulnerability include the loss of old friendships, feelings of isolation, and lack of curriculum continuation.

That’s where outdoor adventure residential programmes lend a helping hand by enabling behavioural adaptions that support positive educational transitions, and more optimistic outlooks. Research suggests that by empowering children to take responsibility for their own comfort, safety and learning, through tailored outdoor adventure programming, authentic consequences are provided which can lead to improvements in their well-being and personal adaptability.  

We know, you may think, that’s easy for us to say as a provider of outdoor adventure and experiential learning. But it’s true. Kingswood’s Head of Impact and Learning, Dr John Allan, alongside Vikki Slee from Leeds Beckett University, created an evidence-based study that evaluated the efficacy of three contrasting induction programmes chosen to facilitate improvements in children’s psychological well-being and self-determination during their transition into secondary school.

An evidence-based study into the value of outdoor learning for school transitions

The study was created in partnership with educational providers and outdoor practitioners, and a group of 100 school children, mean age of 11 years, as a purposive sample of pupils transiting into three inner-city secondary schools in the North of UK. It is worth noting that, the majority of pupils were representatives of lower SES households (classes 5 and 6) and ethnic minorities. Of the 100 school children, 60% attended a tailored outdoor adventure residential (which incorporated the associated school’s values and objectives), 20% carried out classroom-based activities, and the remaining 20% participated in a pre-existing, more generic outdoor adventure residential.

Here are the key results from their research:

The group of 60% attending a tailored outdoor education residential were continually aligning with the school’s ideology to develop self-determined learners and promote the core values of honesty, integrity, compassion and excellence. These principles equate to the recognised qualities needed for transition and are associated with the three underpinning components of the Self Determination Theory. These components include Competence (the ability to complete tasks), Autonomy (the capacity to self-direct learning) and Relatedness (how well a person can connect with others). Findings showed that:

• Pupils were empowered to be responsible for planning, organising, executing and reviewing naturally emerging experiences beyond primary-level learning, even when things did not go to plan.
• Therefore, within the limits of safety, pupils perceived being directly responsible for shaping their learning outcomes and for the nature and direction of the activities undertaken. This included pupils working collaboratively and in negotiation with facilitators, whether building rafts, organising equipment for journeys or ensuring personal and collective safety.
• To further bridge to the secondary school curriculum, protocols for outdoor adventure activities were infused with learning tasks from physical education, numeracy, literacy and information technology
• Group presentations allowed pupils to present evidence of their learning through role play, songs, poetry, narratives and poster work. Themes emanating from this work included (i) dealing with fear of the unknown, (ii) inclusion, (iii) empathy for others, (iv) sharing, and (v) future desires to go to university.

The first comparison group experienced an active one-week induction programme delivered in school. Activities focussed on integrating pupils into their new environment, familiarising them with subject areas, and helping them to form friendships. A second comparison group involved children who attended a five-day commercial OA residential programme. This comprised team building challenges, land- and water-based pursuits. There was no attempt to align this programme to the school’s educational objectives or aspects of self-determination and general well-being. All activities were delivered by experienced qualified personnel.

Immediately and four months later, findings from quantitative and qualitative data, including psychological needs and well-being scales, open discussions and semi-structured interviews, showed that:  

• The tailored outdoor adventure programme achieved the greatest improvement in psychological well-being compared to the school-based induction, which reported a reduction, and the generic programme, which registered a small improvement.
• The tailored outdoor programme also recorded statistically significant differences in autonomy compared to the school induction programme, and the generic outdoor adventure programme.
• Plus, the tailored outdoor adventure programme also increased the competence of school children, as well as academic attainment and attendance. There was also a statistically significant difference in relatedness between the tailored outdoor adventure programme and its generic counterpart.

What some of the children who took part in the tailored outdoor adventure residential said:

“I was proud of raft building, I kept falling off but learnt how to climb back on.”

“I learned that you can show compassion without even realizing it! I know that I can show it to my friends now. I feel happier.”

“Having done the residential I think I can cope with secondary school responsibility because I know I am capable of it.”

“My favourite thing was doing a presentation, this made me feel excited to do it again at school and not be so scared.”

“I found working together meant it were easier - If I was on my own, I wouldn’t have done it.”

“I have lots of people to talk to now and I can go to my teachers.”

“We have more friends because we slept in the same room and did activities together so we helped and supported all the time.”

Here’s what some of the teacher’s said about the tailored outdoor adventure programme:

“If the trust and relationship is not there, the pupils do not have much confidence in the classroom (or in you) which links into lower academic attainment.”

“Usually we see pupils only twice a week for an hour and so it takes longer to form relationships... gaining trust and understanding of how they learn may take till Christmas - this is a way to get them on track before then.”

“Unfamiliar activities act as a leveller, whereby some children who traditionally are more dominant in school may be stretched out of their comfort zones outside, and those quiet kids get a chance to shine.”

What children said four months following the tailored outdoor adventure programme:

“When I started this school, I was really shy but now my confidence has grown because I got to know people better than if we didn’t go on residential.”

“Yeah, I remember the time we had at the Outdoor Centre, and when I start to feel nervous, I remember how well I got on and how you have to try something even if it is scary.”

“Practice makes perfect as I learnt in archery that’s because I saw improvements in me, so I practice much more now with other things.”

What we know from this study and our work at Kingswood

• Giving children early opportunities to take control for their own learning through nature-based tailored outdoor adventure programming improves their psychological well-being and adaptability to combat transitional challenges.
• Schools that report successful transitions help children to develop new friendships, become more self-reliant, and promote curriculum interest and continuity.
• The Self-Determination Theory (SDT) proposes that conditions which support high levels of Autonomy (feelings of independence and control), Competence (a sense of accomplishment) and Relatedness (ability to get along with others) will help to nurture high-quality forms of motivation, which underpins wellness in that setting.
• Intense challenges in outdoor adventure, which emphasise the need for self-reliance, may create real senses of capability through individual’s overcoming dissonance.
• Outdoor adventure residential programming for promoting positive behavioural adaptations is pertinent for educational transitions. These include short-term and lasting improvements in self-efficacy, social connectedness, problem solving, resilience and academic performance.
• Outdoor learning generates ‘social capital’ by boosting self-confidence and creativity, fostering pride and a sense of belonging, and improving cooperation, honesty, trust and compassion.
• Children who take part in tailored outdoor adventure programmes, like the ones we run at Kingswood, portray confidence in their abilities, and contentment and appreciation for others.
• Outdoor adventure creates an array of unfamiliar experiences to compel individuals to engage with risk and uncertainty. This helps make an authentic sense of capability initiated through a supported, controlled disruption of everyday behaviours.
• Green spaces significantly contribute to improvements in children’s mental health and wellbeing. Just five minutes of exercise undertaken in an urban green space may be sufficient to boost physical and mental well-being of young people through ‘biophilia’, described as an innate connection to nature.
• Personal and social skills, which contribute to the effective transition of school children may be best optimised through carefully constructed residential experiences, incorporating challenges which are shaped to accommodate the specific abilities of participants. This includes purposeful exposure of children to nature-based outdoor adventure, whereby teachers collaborate with experienced outdoor adventure providers to shape programming which meets the aims of schools.

Read the full research study, here

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