CHANGES IN EDUCATION: SOME IMPLICATIONS FOR CAVE DEVELOPMENT
ABSTRACT
Educational practices in Australia have changed more in the last decade than in the previous fifty years, and much more emphasis is now placed on personal and social development, on close ties with the community outside the school, and on outdoor education in its broadest sense. The results include growth of caving as a sport, demand for adventure and wilderness experience, and a need for improved interpretation services and facilities. These changes in education demand changes in management practices related to natural resources including caves and karst, and some suggestions to provoke discussion are included.
I have been asked to speak to you today about changes in education and the implications this might have for management of caves and related resources. While some of you would know of my interest in speleology, I can also claim to have seen most of Australia's tourist caves, and several dozen overseas as well, so I do have some understanding of the problems of implementing some of the suggestions which I shall be making.
I would like to start with an overview of the kind of school we would no doubt all remember, compare it with what goes on these days, and explain why and how this might affect your planning and management.
Most of us here have probably been educated in a system, derived philosophically from English grammar and comprehensive schools with an overlay of American egalitarianism. You queued for a measured and pre-determined allotment of English, Mathematics, Science, Geography or whatever, studied the subjects for a prescribed period, passed the prescribed examinations, and perhaps proceeded to college or university to follow the same procedure for another 3, 4 or 5 years. Competitive sport was important at least for the talented few, but was quite divorced from the academic curriculum.
In this system, physical education was something you did on Wednesday afternoon. Bushwalking or camping was something you did with the Scouts, and the environment was a trendy area which you and some like-minded friends dabbled with in your spare time, if you'd ever heard of it, of course. Rock climbing, caving and trekking in Nepal were weekend or vacation pursuits for the unsociable or eccentric.
The one thing which all these pursuits had in common was that they were separate from "real" - in inverted commas - real education. They were extracurricular, extra-mural. So there was a limited range of academically oriented subjects, each studied with a single textbook, each separate from one another and from the world outside.
Well, things have changed, and at this stage, instead of continuing to ramble incoherently as educational practitioners are liable to. I want to pause to paint a few vignettes. I'm sure you'll forgive me if many of these are from Canberra. Not only are these the ones with which I am most familiar, but for several reasons Canberra's school system is now possibly the most progressive, flexible and innovative in Australia. Just how progressive, flexible and innovative you might be able to gather from the fact that one school - a government school in fact - offers for credit such delights as Body Massage and Sexual Awareness 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6!
First, I want you to imagine yourself where I suppose I should be at this very moment, at Weston Creek High School in Canberra. It is a government school, not the most modern, but not atypical either. Physically it looks much as you'd expect a school to look; 1 3-storey building, assembly hall, gymnasium, canteen, corridors, classrooms ....
But schools are people - what are they doing? Well, there's a group of 20 or so grilling sausages over the barbecue. The Bushwalking Club is holding a meeting to plan arrangements for a day walk to the Brindabellas on Saturday, and a 4-day trip to Colong Caves during the May vacation next week. One small class is building a canoe, another class has gone for a walk up nearby Mt Taylor as part of their geography studies and two classes are at the camp at Sturt Island on the Murrumbidgee. There's an Ibo gentleman from Nigeria talking to our African Cultural Studies class. There are about 70 students using the school's library resource centre, 30 are watching a videotape of last week's 'wildlife Australia' and maybe 15 are down at Woolworth's interviewing the manager on aspects of consumer products. One of the students is away sitting on a committee of the Schools Authority, our equivalent of your Department of Education, investigating changes to the Year 10 Certificate. The principal is in Sydney interviewing new teachers. At a table in the foyer, four students are collecting money for a school disco which they organised entirely on their own. There are 2 or 3 parents talking to teachers about their children's progress. Tonight the school will be open until 10.00 p.m. because it operates evening recreational classes too. A lot of classrooms seem to be empty.
Fig. 17 Recent changes in education in Australia
| THE OLD | THE NEW | |
| EDUCATION IS SOMETHING WHICH TAKES PLACE FROM 9 TO 4, MONDAY TO FRIDAY, 39 WEEKS A YEAR | → | LEARNING GOES ON WHEREVER AND WHENEVER CONDITIONS ARE SUITABLE |
| EDUCATION IS SOMETHING WHICH GOES ON IN A SCHOOL BUILDING | → | "THE COMMUNITY SCHOOL" - THE SCHOOL IS NOT EDUCATION, JUST THE HEADQUARTERS FROM WHICH LEARNING IS DIRECTED |
| EDUCATION IS A PREPARATION FOR WORK AND LIFE, SOMETHING YOU DO FROM 5 TO 18 YEARS OF AGE | → | IT MUST BE SEEN AS SOMETHING YOU DO REGULARLY THROUGHOUT LIFE. IT IS PART OF LIFE |
| EDUCATION IS SOMETHING CONTROLLED AND DIRECTED BY TEACHERS | → | TEACHERS BECOME FACILITATORS, LIAISON PEOPLE, ORGANISERS NOT THE 'FOUNT OF KNOWLEDGE' |
| EDUCATION = KNOWLEDGE = "SUBJECTS" | → | EDUCATION = SKILLS OF LEARNING = FORMING OF ATTITUDES = PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT = SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT |
It may not be your traditional image of a school, but education is going on nevertheless. We would like to believe that students are working, and working hard too, not because they feel they are forced to, but because they enjoy it. And that this freer state of mind makes learning much easier and more remembered. The "Old" and "New" approaches to education are summarised in Fig. 17.
1. Many schools in Canberra at least, offer courses or activities related to caving and outdoor pursuits which carry credit for school certificates or even tertiary matriculation. St. Edmunds College offers Caving 1, implying there is more to come. This course is registered with the ACT Schools Authority and appears on the student's school certificates.
Weston Creek High School offers Bushwalking, Caving, and also Rock Climbing. Philip and Dickson Colleges have karst geomorphology as a half-term unit in their geography courses, Hawker College offers majors in Recreation and in Wilderness Activities, including canoeing, cross-country skiing and outdoor survival skills. All these courses are justified in terms of their potential for personal development, their effect on self-confidence, team cooperation and so on. It is instructive to note that in a recent schools cartography competition, the prize-winning entry was a map of Dog Leg Cave at Wee Jasper. (See also Appendices I and II).
2. All state education systems operate field centres which combine studies of the environment, geography and science with recreational activities. For example, the Queensland Department of Education's Outdoor Education Centre at Boonah operates a highly successful wilderness experience programme which combines environmental education, camping and adventure in a wilderness setting.
3. Case studies of environmental issues and management conflicts involving cave and karst resources are creeping into the educational literature, not only in environmental studies but in geography, social studies and politics. The Colong and Bungonia issues have been used not only as studies of environmental conflict but as examples of the workings of pressure groups, grass roots democracy and political decision-making, even of personal and organisational ethics. One of the best documented examples, of course, is that of Mt Etna and I know of at least two publications applying this issue as a case study in the context of geography and environmental education.
4. School expeditions are replacing traditional organised tours as major contributions to learning, and there is already an Australian schools Expeditionary Society. Significant research and exploratory work has been carried out by British senior school students on the caves of Ireland, Iceland and north Norway. There is no reason to doubt that remote areas of Australia, Niugini and South-East Asia could receive similar attention from today's relatively affluent senior students.
IMPLICATIONS FOR MANAGEMENT
Educational values per se seem to have been neglected or perhaps misunderstood in discussions of cave management and classification of caves, if not in resource management generally. Certainly this has been the case in traditional tourist cave inspections. I acknowledge the special attention paid to school parties in such centres as Jenolan but suggest that these meet only one or two of the needs outlined in Figure 18. The National Heritage Assessment Study conducted by the Australian Speleological Federation made no specific provision for educational values in the assessment significance of caves. None of the cave classification schemes which I have seen, including my own early one of 1966, makes particular provision for education.
Certain characteristics of cave and karst resources are recognised as being of educational value, of course, e.g. morphological forms, cave decorations, and special features such as the bone deposits in Victoria Cave. Many cave reserves have nature trails, and some, not enough, have small visitor centres. Unguided inspections of the type available at Yarrangobilly and Wombeyan have good potential for education in the hands of a sympathetic teacher and sound interpretation materials. However, the educational value of easy "adventure" caves, perceived wilderness experiences and expeditions to remote areas has not been generally recognised by management authorities.
Figure l8 contains a summary of the kinds of management thinking, principles and action required to meet education-oriented objectives. Although many of these involve no more than a re-appraisal of management attitudes, I do feel that most of our tourist cave areas have grossly inadequate visitor information centres. The 'show them' approach referred to cannot be adopted if there is not even so much as a simple map of the cave on display or freely available. It is a sad reflection on bureaucratic management attitudes that the only displays in the Grand Arch at Jenolan are three carefully illuminated copies of the Acts and Regulations relating to the caves. The only displayed cave map is in Caves House and therefore is seen by only a tiny proportion of visitors, and was in any event generously provided by the guides and not by management.
The suggested re-orientation of management thinking and practice does not have to be justified solely on the grounds of catering for school parties. I have mentioned earlier how educationists have come to see the community itself as being part of the educational process. As well, there has been a significant blurring of boundaries between education, recreation and work. Many of the principles which I have shown as representing education-oriented objectives are the emerging needs and characteristics of the whole population, the so-called 'learning society'.
Finally, some thoughts for the future. We now have a respectable number of national parks and recreation reserves as well as urban parks and playing fields. But why this oft-expressed aim of preservation for future generations if we are not clear about the reasons? Just as we had trouble convincing legislators of the need for nature conservation, so we are having difficulty understanding and convincing others of the need for conservation of another environment, the human environment, which is no loss fragile and susceptible. I think it was Xavier Herbert who advanced the thesis that Australia missed its opportunity in the 1920s to become a great nation. There is a strong empirical case for asserting that four major wars, a devastating depression and thirty years spent in material recovery, blighted the spirit, self-image and aesthetic experiences of three generations of Australians.
Teachers, rangers and cave guides all have a vested professional interest in promoting both nature and human conservation measures, and finding ways of merging the two in such a way that conservation of the natural environment truly contributes to a betterment of the human environment.
Fig. 18 Market needs and characteristics.
| TRADITIONAL | EDUCATIONAL - ORIENTED | |
| AT THE PARK / RESERVE LEVEL | ||
| 1. ONE MAIN AIM | → | A VARIETY OF AIMS |
| 2. PASSIVE CONSUMERS | → | ACTIVE CONSUMERS |
| 3. INTERPRETATION (if any) = IMPARTING OF KNOWLEDGE | → | OUTDOOR EDUCATION |
| AT THE CAVE /WITHIN CAVE LEVEL | ||
| 4. FOCAL POINT = CAVE ITSELF | → | FOCAL POINT = EDUCATION EXPERIENCES TO BE GAINED IN THE CAVE |
| 5. FOCAL AIM = ENTERTAINMENT | → | FOCAL AIM = LEARNING (CAVE IS AN EXTENDED CLASSROOM) |
| 6. DIVERSION FROM REALITY (into fantasy etc) | → | EMPHASIS ON REALITY |
| 7. SUPERFICIALITY | → | SIMPLIFICATION |
| 8. ONE TOUR ONLY, OR SEVERAL ESSENTIAL SIMILAR TOURS | → | VARIETY OF EXPERIENCES ABOVE AND BELOW GROUND |
| SOME COMMON POINTS | ||
| 9. AROUSAL OF CURIOSITY & SENSE OP WONDER | ||
| 10. SIMILAR DIMENSIONS OF ANTICIPATION - TRAVEL - ON SITE EXPERIENCE - TRAVEL HOME - RECOLLECTION | ||
| 11. "SHOW THEM" ETC | ||
SUMMARY
- The major thrust of recent curriculum change in education has been towards:
- An overlapping and integration of education with work and with recreation/leisure.
- Much more education outdoors, away from the school and in areas not traditionally regarded as school work.
- An emphasis on learning by finding and doing . . . "It is always the person who sees, discovers, explores or experiences a situation for himself, rather than being told about it, who gets the most out of it. Such learning is faster, is more deeply impressed on the mind, and is retained longer."
- As a result there will be continuing increase in usage of caves and karst resources, and much of this increase will come from a younger age group. Remoteness or physical difficulty of access will not be a protection for caves, indeed it may act as an attraction. There is a huge latent demand for adventure and wilderness activities both in schools and in the population at large.
- Management authorities must plan for a range of users of their resources for educational purposes. A suggested categorisation of such users is:
- Conventional tourist tours with an educational interpretation and possibly a small 'adventure' component for young students.
- "Discovery" tours in wild caves, guided and unguided.
- Wilderness tours of longer duration, unguided.
- Expedition-type forays, e.g. to Nullarbor, Tasmania.
- There are rights and responsibilities to be observed on all sides. Teachers have a responsibility to plan definite educational aims in bringing students to your facilities. You have a corresponding responsibility to provide appropriate facilities for these aims to be met, ranging from simple access to sophisticated interpretation services.
- "Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing at all." I see no educational value in the practice of giving out or selling samples of fossils or cave decorations.
- An old guides' adage goes something like this: "Show them what you're going to show them show them, and show them what you've shown them".
I believe you will work better with educational groups if you amend this slightly: "Help them find out what you're going to show them, help them find out as you're showing them, and help them find out more about what you've shown them" - Management practices will have to change to provide for education-oriented objectives. These needs and characteristics will, however, come to describe the whole population in the future and not just traditional school education groups.
Appendix I
OUTDOOR EDUCATION AT AN ALTERNATIVE SCHOOL
*Extract from "Outdoor Education in the A.C.T."
The A.M.E. School is a parent-formed school now in its sixth year. As a fee supported school, it relies on the cooperation of parents, staff, and pupils to exist.
In joining A.M.E., I was able to bring along from my former N.S.W. position a $3500 Schools Commission grant for integrated excursions. The opportunity to teach in an environment which allows outdoor activities as an integral part of the teaching program has taken me over 15 years to attain.
Early in my career, I found that taking inner Sydney students some place like Wee Jasper for caving resulted in both the enjoyment of each others company and an extension of the students' awareness of an alternative environment. The term "outdoor education" was of no relevance to me then - the trips were simply something I did with a number of economically deprived kids who generally had never been more than 30 miles from their homes.
As a primary school teacher with a philosophy based on getting children out of the classroom and into outdoor experiences, I have found over the past three years at A.M.E. that specific outdoor activities like caving, rock climbing, river crossing, and cross country skiing build a group feeling among most of the kids, and give them a better concept of themselves. I believe that if a child can feel that he has accomplished something difficult he not only feels good about it, but will transfer that success to other things. If he has tried and succeeded, he will try other things hoping to succeed in them as well. It is in this area of group identity and transfer that I feel lie the value of these activities, even with children who seemingly are quite happy at school and have a lot of outdoor experiences with their own parents when away from school.
I think to give you an indication of what outdoor education is like at this particular "alternative" school, I should use a specific example. In this way one can contrast it with other methods of approach.
Last year another staff member, Vaughn Croucher and I felt that it would be a great idea to introduce all the primary school kids (about 80) to a caving experience. We sat down over a couple of nights and worked out what we exactly intended doing. By contacting a farmer at Wee Jasper we got permission to use a vacant farm house as accommodation. We divided the groups into 20s based mainly on classroom groups and contacted parents for supervision and help with transport. Sounds very typical doesn't it? The rest of the arrangements, however, we left to my class of 10-11 year olds. By this time they had spent about 20 nights away with me so they were proficient in organising the menu and ringing people to make final arrangements. They found parents to take them shopping and bought the goods. They kept a tally of what was spent and wrote receipts for money accepted. They organised themselves into cooking groups and when we went to Wee Jasper, they did the cooking and handling of the groups as we arrived. Four of the children in my group stayed the full eight days of the trip. All of my group at some time either acted as cooks, guides, or helpers for the smaller ones. The groups who came down were rostered by the more experienced kids and were shown what tasks to do. Vaughn and I with the parents were involved in taking the children to the commercial caves and organising equipment for those going into the non-commercial caves.
A lot of my time is spent training the kids in the things that are important for them to know on a particular trip - rope tying for rock climbing, menu making for camping, safety measures and fitness for crosscountry skiing. I receive a lot of cooperation from the staff and feel free to involve my group in any activity as long as safety measures have been covered.
Teachers here, although they may not approach teaching in the same way, are tolerant of different methods and are helpful. Sometimes as with the caving experience the main emphasis might be on introducing pupils to a new experience. Other times it may be more specific as for example in orienteering where the emphasis might be on teaching map-reading or taking bearings. In the future I hope to use the resources of our new school to make photographic records of our trips for presentation to parents. From trips come a lot of writing although I'm wary of attempting to trick kids into an artificial situation where I say isn't this an interesting experience could you explain why to me in three pages. If I want kids to specifically write about their experience I state so before the trip and they know the purpose. If they write because they have become interested, then that's pleasing.
Children who have been in my class three years ago are now in the secondary section of the school and I find that I can call on their help when we are going on trips and in teaching skills such as swimming.
I think that the major benefit of teaching here is the willingness of people to accept different attitudes to teaching and to be helpful and receptive to new ideas.
Barry Cooper has taught, at one time or another, grades K - 12, in Canada and Australia. He has been at the A.M.E. School for three years.
Appendix II
WILDERNESS ACTIVITIES AT AN A.C.T. SECONDARY COLLEGE
(Hawker College is one of the five secondary colleges in Canberra, providing government education specifically for year 11 and 12)
During 1976, in its first year of operation, Hawker College offered students a limited number of wilderness-resource based registered units involving students in a commitment of two hours per week for twelve weeks.
These included "Beginning Cross-Country skiing", "Outdoor Survival" and "Canoeing". Also offered was "Beginning Downhill Skiing" - an activity which could be said to be both resource and facility-based since, in addition to the snowfields, permanent accommodation and uphill transport are necessary.
EARLY GROWTH
In 1977 the programme was expanded with the addition of "Intermediate Cross-Country Skiing", "Intermediate Downhill Skiing" and "Cycle Touring". Also during the year, the College was fortunate to gain an A.C.T. Schools Authority Curriculum Development Grant of $1865 for the purchase of equipment for "Wilderness Expeditions". This enabled us to establish a basic stock of rucksacks, tents and sleeping bags which could be used not only for purely wilderness expeditions, but also to facilitate excursions arranged for the study of agriculture, geography and geophysical sciences including biology, geology, ecology and environmental studies.
STAFFING
Appropriate staffing is a major factor in the conduct of adventure-type activities and at Hawker we were most fortunate that from the outset we had experienced, competent men and women who were prepared to organise and assist in mounting courses. We have staff members with many years experience in skiing, canoeing and bushwalking. Another staff member has some fifteen years' experience in the organisation and administration of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme.
AN ACCREDITED COURSE?
Having had a most pleasing response from students to those registered units which we offered in our first year; early in 1977 we decided to examine the possibilities of developing a three-unit Accredited Minor Course which would involve students for four hours per week for one year. In addition, there would be practical exercises and two and three-day excursions which, in most cases would be arranged at weekends.
We were of the opinion that the exercise did not necessarily have to involve all the usual processes associated with the writing of an Accredited Course in what might be regarded as a new area of experience for senior secondary students, but that much of the material contained in registered courses which were already operating could be included in what we were starting to call "Wilderness Activities". For example, we believed that the holding of certificates in First Aid and Water Survival should be regarded as basic pre-requisites for entry to units which would involve students in potentially hazardous activities in wilderness areas - and we already had registered units running which led to the card of these two certificates. Thus, this became the course work for Unit 1.
Unit 2 would then need to be devoted to the acquisition of basic outdoor survival skills. Unit 3 would be the culmination of the course which we decided should be an extended expedition either on foot, on horseback, on skis, or by canoe or cycle - as selected by the participant.
The best available syllabus, developed and tested over a considerable number of years in Australia, is that in use by the Duke of Edinburgh's Award scheme. So the Duke of Edinburgh's Award handbook provided our "course content" - with some very minor modifications.
Standards to be expected, and the means of assessment applicable to our students' Final Expedition might have become extremely subjective. To avoid this we once again decided to use those standards laid down in the Award Handbook for the Silver Level, as we judged these to be most appropriate for young people in the 16-18 years age group.
Course Outline
| UNIT (TERM) |
Area "A" (2 hours per week) |
Area "B" (2 hours per week) |
| 1 | First Aid Red Cross or St John's Certificate |
Swimming and Personal survival RLSS Awards: Water Safety, Resuscitation Safe Swimmer Survival Certificate |
| 2 | Survival Skills 1 - Planning and Organisation - Equipment Planning (Personal & Group) - Campcraft 1 - Food Planning 1 - Navigation 1 - Country Code - Practical Applications |
Choose from: Beginning Downhill Skiing Intermediate Downhill skiing Beginning Cross-country skiing Intermediate Cross-Country skiing Canoe Building, Cycling |
| 3 | Survival Skills II - Wilderness First Aid - Navigation - Food Planning II - Route Planning - Campcraft II - Safety Procedures - Records and Log Books - Practical Applications |
Expeditions: (Choose from) Walking Cycling Canoeing Horse Riding Snow-skiing |
AIMS OF THE COURSE
- to promote physical activities and lifetime recreation.
- to encourage and assist the student in exploring a variety of wilderness activities.
- to provide the student with the opportunity to develop skills and acquire knowledge that will ensure, to as large an extent as is possible, his safety and enjoyment in wilderness activities.
The aims of a "Wilderness Activity" programme may also be said to include:
To heighten awareness of and foster respect for:
- self - through the meeting of challenge (adventure);
- others - through group experiences and the sharing of decisions; and
- the natural environment - through direct experience.
Thus, the emphasis is on effective learning and relationships, rather than cognitive skills.
OBJECTIVES OF THE COURSE
- to introduce the student to a wide variety of activities which might be included in wilderness recreation.
- to discuss and establish the need for general physical fitness in relation to wilderness recreation.
- to involve the student in a continuing fitness programme through general physical activities and/or practical sessions involving skill development as related to specific activities (e.g. canoeing, nordic skiing, rock climbing) .
- to develop specific skills necessary for confident and safe involvement in a broad range of wilderness activities.
- to ensure that the student has met basic First Aid and Lifesaving / personal survival requirements to assist him in coping with emergencies with limited assistance.
- to discuss, develop and set guidelines for organisation, management, and participation in wilderness activities.
- to involve the student in wilderness expeditions of both short and extended duration with the goals of individual satisfaction and personal development.
In behavioural terms, a possible range of objectives is that a young person, as a result of taking part in an activity, will:
- in relation to SELF, for example, develop self-knowledge, self-confidence, self-discipline, self-respect, physical capabilities, skills as appropriate, attain and experience success, accept responsibility, accept the leadership of others, sharpen sensory perception
- in relation to OTHERS, for example, with other members of the group, plan activities, evaluate progress, share leadership, coordinate their activities, identify and use the total resources, represent the group, communicate effectively, identify personal characteristics and needs, counsel individuals, help others to learn, set an example ... and
- in relation to the ENVIRONMENT, for example, develop an affinity with and awareness of the natural environment, value natural beauty, observe and describe the immediate environment, explain the forms and processes, including the weather, interpret the development of the environment. accept the importance of conservation, stimulate the imagination ...
Many of these objectives could relate to specialist studies, e.g. geography, geology, meteorology, environmental studies.
THE ACCREDITATION PROCESS
The panel appointed by the Agency consisted of:
- a co-ordinator from the Schools Authority;
- the President of the Local Award committee of the Duke of Edinburgh's Award system who was elected Chairman;
- a representative of the A.C.T. Bush Search and Rescue Service;
- a representative of the Canberra Bushwalking Club;
- a practising Master Teacher from the 'School Without Walls' with many years experience in adventure-type activities, and
- a practising teacher from a state high school, with previous experience in organising camping programmes while a member of the staff of Canberra Grammar School.
This group held a series of meetings over some three months at each of which either one or both of the course proponents were present. At the conclusion of its deliberations the panel recommended an initial accreditation period of three years. The Agency subsequently approved the three-year "Accredited" status for the years 1978-80 inclusive.
The following extracts from the Panel's Report are regarded as being of considerable significance:
- The following observations are made because the panel recognises two unusual aspects of the "Wilderness Activities" course. The first is that its operation pre-supposes the involvement of people in circumstances in which there are elements of danger. The second is that the successful operation of the course will contribute significantly to the community's acceptance of the role of outdoor education in the operation of its schools.
- Constant themes in the Panel's deliberations have been the necessity to ensure that a high staff student ratio is maintained in any "Wilderness Activity", and that a Principal must be absolutely certain of the competence of teachers involved. The Panel has no doubt about the competence of the proponents of this course. It urges special caution, however, if they should both leave the staff of Hawker College.
- In a course such as this the Panel notes that a particularly strong element of subjectivity will exist in both the assessment of students' performance and the evaluation of the effectiveness of the course. Its members agree, for example, that whilst progress towards tangible short-term objectives will be measured adequately, one measure of the effectiveness of the course as a whole may well be the attitudes of students a decade after they complete it.
In the light of that point of view the term "assessment instruments" is seen to have limited application to the teachers' task of assessing a student's performance.
- Panel members have offered, with the concurrence of the proponents of the course:
- to remain together as a Panel and meet the proponents once per term in future years both to add its support to them as an advisory body and to provide a forum for discussion about the progress of the course;
- to provide advice upon request to the Principals, School Boards, and Teachers in any matter relating to the course.
THE COURSE IN ACTION
Thirty students elected "Wilderness Activities" in their course selections for 1978. Of this number, twenty-two were finally selected to commence Unit 1. This reduction was necessary because of staffing limitations within the college and also because it is only possible to set up one class in First Aid in any given term (we rely upon voluntary Red Cross lecturers to provide instruction in this section of the course).
The group is making good progress in both areas of Unit 1 and is most enthusiastic. Both students and staff members are looking forward to Units 2 and 3 when we will have the opportunity to engage in the wide variety of outdoor activities which the course encompasses.
Brian Bradshaw is the Department Head, Physical Education and Recreation, Hawker College, A.C.T. and a member of the A.C.T. Duke of Edinburgh's Award Regional Committee. Prior to coming to Canberra, he was the Director of the National Fitness Centre, Narrabeen Lakes, Sydney. He has recently completed a B.Ed. with a major in Recreational Planning.