Outdoor Life Activities

Outdoor Life Activities, one of the courses I have followed throughout my exchange semester in Alta, Norway. Below, I will describe the different activities and courses we had each week. And at the end, my home exam is placed, so you can see how home exams in Norway look like. 

August 28 – September 3, 2017 – The outdoor class has started. The first class, we conquered 52km within a day on a mountain bike, through the mountains. It was tough but amazing. During this week, we also learned about mapping, working with compasses, providing first aid and how to deal with emergency situations. Very useful, also for later in the hospitality industry. A certificate for the first aid needs to be taken, but the beginnings of the knowledge are present.

September 11 – 17, 2017 – During the beginning of the week we had a canoe trip with school. We went 20km of biking, then 20km of canoeing, and finished with 5km of hiking. Our first overnight trip with the Outdoorlife class. Learned rescuing in the water and new techniques, but also trip planning and safety.

September 18 – 24, 2017 – Tuesday was my birthday, first birthday that I did not spent at home with my family, but I had a lot of people around me that genuinely cared, celebrated this day with me and we ended up having so much fun. I did not expect so many people to remember this day, so I was surprised. From Wednesday till Thursday we had a trip, 10km of biking combined with hiking. It was truly beautiful. The teacher brought birthday cake to the trip with her, so sweet. We also made blueberry soup from freshly picked blueberries. I am surprised what we can use in the nature here, we can drink water from almost every lake or stream, and pick berries where ever we want. Something which is not always possible in the Netherlands.

October 2 – 8, 2017– the beginning of the week consisted of having fun with my roommates, school and movie nights. At the end of the week we went on another trip with school with the Norwegian class (the Friluftsliv class). They taught us a lot of things about their culture, about the Sami people and old ways of living. We learned how to set up a lavvu, making an emergency shelter, different ways of making fire, making ovens in the nature, navigating with GPS and navigating via map and compass.

October 9 – 15, 2017 – another overnight trip with outdoor life activities. This time hiking and hunting. We learned more about the indigenous way of hunting. During this trip we saw the first snow. In the weekend we cooked a thanksgiving meal with our little family.

October 16 – 23, 2017– On Wednesday till Monday we were outdoor on our own trip that we had to plan for outdoor life activites. We decided to go outdoor for 6 days to the island Sørøya, north from Hammerfest. The planning was securely done, planned food, to emergency plans, to the route. In the end it worked out perfectly, we hiked over 60kms in total, experienced every weather possible and saw a lot of animals. It was great! 

October 24 - November 5, 2017 - Snow has started to fall and the days are starting to get very short. In my free time I practiced skiing with friends. So during the class in this week, I would be a bit prepared, since I am not really a skiing hero. 

Unfortunately after this, I got a knee injury in both knees, so I was not able to attend the other skiing classes. 

Homexam Outdoor Life Activities 

 Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a School Setting

1.    Introduction

This paper will stress Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. Friluftsliv is a term that is present in Norway. What makes Frilufsliv unique is the fact that almost all nature in Norway is free. People practice Friluftsliv to experience freedom, peace and to get a mental boost. Several theories regarding Friluftsliv and its most important elements are reviewed, argued, discussed and later applied to teaching in a school setting. Leadership, outdoor learning, personal growth and outdoor guidance will be elaborated on. Furthermore, Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life will be reviewed from the viewpoint of the Netherlands, different characterizations and the importance of Friluftsliv will be stressed.

2.    Methods

This paper was written to explain and review Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. Secondary data like, Google Scholar and the library web Oria, were used to collect reports, journals and publications written in English. The paper is mainly consisting of secondary data, nevertheless, some of the information written in this paper can be found as being local, from trips in the nature with the Outdoor Life Activities class in 2017 or personal opinions and experiences from the author. Therefore, this information is not retraceable on the internet. The limitation when writing this paper was the page limit, and it was a challenge to fully elaborate on all topics.

3.    Theoretical Background

3.1  Leadership

The best way to describe leadership can be found in an old Chinese Proverb: “Give a person a fish and you feed them for a day. Teach a person how to fish and you feed them for life. Teach a person how to learn to fish and they don’t need a fishing teacher. Teach a person how to learn and they don’t need a teacher.” Leadership is all about achieving a task, team-building and developing the individual (Cooper, 1998: 35-45). Which again is all aimed towards skills, new experiences, leisure, sustainable lifestyles, and personal and social development. All these aims are different per group. Since this paper is focusing on Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting, the main focus of this paper will be the youths.

Different leadership styles and theories exist. Cooper (1998: 35-45) states that a leader can be an instructor or a facilitator. The instructor is mainly telling, task oriented, competitive, with an emphasis on skills. Whereas the facilitator is mainly sharing, people oriented, co-operative, with an emphasis on experience, reflection and learning. Regarding to the different theories, the situational leadership theory has been chosen as main leadership theory for this paper. According to this theory, there are three main factors taken into consideration, namely the leader, the followers and the situation. It explains leadership based on time, place and circumstances (Bass, 1990). According to Martin et all (2006: 39-51), situational leadership accounts for two ideals. First, any situation determines the leadership qualities of a leader and which leader should lead. Second, the leadership qualities of a person are the product of previous leadership situations that molded in with the person.

3.2  Outdoor Learning & Personal Growth

Nowadays, youths are being kept indoors more. Basic outdoor activities like crossing the road, going to the shop or playing in a park are being denied and supervised by parents. This leads to a growing concern around young people their health (Cooper, 1998: 28-34).

However, outdoor education has a lot of benefits for youths (Hopkins & Putnam, 1993: 63-86). These benefits are mainly creating by the risk that is present in different situations. The risk can come in different forms, physical, social and spiritual. Physical risk entails the risk that can occur during a trip, for example being trapped in a storm or another dangerous situation like animal attacks for instance. Social risk is the fear that for example occurs during public speech. Spiritual risk occurs for example when the learner is placed in a situation where he/she must confront itself or the meaning of life and death.

The benefits of these risks are, sharing experiences with others, a challenging environment, exploring personal beliefs, working in small groups during a trip, attitudes and values that different people share or express during a trip, and using the knowledge and skills of each individual towards the development of the whole group (Hopkins & Putnam, 1993: 63-86). However, too high risk can lead to a negative experience, devastation and disaster. The main conclusion, nevertheless, can be drawn that outdoor education stimulates personal growth and outdoor learning on levels of change, taking risk, decision taking, responsibility and confidence development. Which is all important to stimulate and develop youths in to strong and independent adults.

3.3  Outdoor Guidance

In order to gain personal growth and to stimulate outdoor learning, outdoor guidance should be provided. A definition of guidance could be, to show, delegate, raise, enlighten, supervise, lead, advise, orientate, teach and help. According to Gundersen & Østrem (2007: 67-82), outdoor guidance is a development-oriented activity. The goal is to contribute to reflection, afterthought and provide assistance in making qualified choices, which will lead to change and improvement. However, an atmosphere of trust, support and challenge should be present, to gain change and improvement.

In 1967, Nils Faarlund established the Norwegian Mountain School. This is believed to have established the pedagogical working method. Which again is the establishment of outdoor guidance. In outdoor guidance there are different keywords present.

• ·         Pedagogical working method: basic values about societies character, in particular the views of nature, human values, and other values. Furthermore, it entails a personal definition of guidance in the outdoors.
• ·         Aims of outdoor guidance: why one should teach and learn. This leads to the content of outdoor guidance.
• ·         Content of outdoor guidance: what should be taught and learned. The pedagogical philosophy plays a big role in this. The content is connected to the methods of outdoor guidance.
• ·         Methods of outdoor guidance: how to teach and to learn. Which again has different forms, supervision, consultation and advise.

Gundersen & Østrem (2007: 67-82) stated that guidance has three different traditions, traditional therapy, craft/trade tradition, and action and reflection tradition. The traditional therapy is ranked as the least important, however, both other traditions have characteristics from the traditional therapy. The craft/trade tradition can be viewed as the master/apprentice tradition. The apprentice learns by observing what the master does. The goal of the craft/trade tradition is copying and mastering. The action and reflection tradition focusses on helping the group members to become conscious of the basic knowledge, experience and values that each individual holds. Therefore, the goal of the action and reflection tradition is insight into different situations.

In outdoor guidance, just as in leadership, different styles occur (Gundersen & Østrem, 2007: 67-82):

• ·         The preacher: telling the participant what he/she should do
• ·         The instructor: focused on providing skill training
• ·         The organizer: is neutral and objective, so participants are not influenced, but it gives a great degree of responsibility for individual learning
• ·         The process guide: central focus points are dialogue, communication and cooperation
• ·         The product developer: goal-oriented, engaged with changes and improvement

Next to different styles, an outdoor guide should possess some fundamental communication skills such as, observation, listening, be able to ask relevant questions, attempt to expand awareness, and to give good advice. These will all influence the way the group perceives and is able to listen to the outdoor guide. Furthermore, the following basic fundaments also influence outdoor guidance. Time will influence experience and development. Nature will give the richest experiences, since it is as free as possible. The group size should be small, so each individual can participate and be responsible. The group composition related to diversity will have advantages in cases from homogenous and complete diverse groups. Both related to experiences and base skills. This can be viewed as well in the case of the Friluftsliv class and the Outdoor Life Activities class (2017). The Friluftsliv is almost complete homogenous, all with a similar background and that mostly have acquired the same skills throughout their lives. The Outdoor Life Activities class is a complete diverse group, all come from a different background, with different previous educations and different skills. Nevertheless, this does not influence the experiences they have together, they are in it together and will learn from each other, since everyone has a different opinion or view to share. However, in both cases the outdoor guide is the one leading the process of the development of the group and thereby steering the learning experiences of each individual. Therefore, outdoor guidance is of great importance to youths on the level of personal and group development and dynamics.

3.4  Friluftsliv

Friluftsliv is a term that dates further back than leadership. According to Faarlund, Dahle & Jensen (2007: 393-396), Friluftsliv finds its roots in the Romantic movement of Europe. It is connected to the Romanticism, since it is about free nature, as well as humans, which both have intrinsic values. If Friluftsliv would be translated to English it would be free-air-life, which can be connected to the Romanticist meaning. Outdoor life is not a complete verb to describe the term, however, Norwegian Friluftsliv is at home where the free Nature is to be found. It has nothing to do with competitive sports or commercialized activities, it is about identity. Therefore, it is difficult to understand the term fully for non-Norwegians. According to Zoglowek (2013:43-62), Friluftsliv has nowadays developed as a lifestyle of the Norwegian people.  

As stated above, youths nowadays are kept more inside, they are protected more at average. Odden (2008: 69) found that the most important motives to be engaged in Friluftsliv are mostly mentally related, it gives new strength, a boost, it relives stress, it gets the person away from everyday life, the quietness and peace of nature can be experienced, it is a change from everyday life. Furthermore, it is found that people appreciate the movement, training and the usage of the body in practicing Friluftsliv. Zoglowek (2013: 43-62), found that the experience of freedom, silence, wilderness and mastering were perceived the most important to Friluftsliv students at Finnmark University College in Alta between 2006-2011.

4.    Discussion

The topic of Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting has been chosen, since there is a growing concern regarding the health of youths in the present, which is caused by the overprotection and locking the children and youths inside by parents (Cooper, 1998: 28-34). Below, the importance of teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting will be reviewed, argued, and discussed. Furthermore, it will be applied and compared to the Netherlands specifically.

4.1  Relevant elements 

Different elements are important when teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. The elements that are considered most important by the author are: leadership, personal growth, outdoor learning and outdoor guidance. Below, is shown why these elements are of importance and how they can be applied to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting.

4.1.1        Leadership

Leadership is perfectly reviewed in the Chinese Proverb above. It is not only about giving, or teaching how to achieve a skill, it is about more. The person should be taught how to learn, so a teacher is not needed and they can handle on their own, and perhaps show other people when everything is completely mastered. It is all about teambuilding and developing the individual. Which is all important in school as well. Therefore, leadership can be considered as one of the most important elements when teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting.

Cooper (1998:35-45) stated that there are two different types of leaders, instructors and facilitators. When teaching Friluftsliv, skills are of importance, however, the most important is the experiences, reflection and learning, since this will all stimulate personal growth and personal reflection. Therefore, the facilitator should be the dominant leadership style when teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting.

The situational leadership theory has been chosen as main leadership theory for this paper, since it describes leadership in the outdoors the best. Its dependent on time, place and circumstances (Bass, 1990). These variables will influence the way a leader is behaving and teaching. Moreover, it will influence the learning experience and the development of the students as well. The conclusion can be drawn that leadership is of great importance when it comes to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting, and should be handled with great care and precaution.

4.1.2        Outdoor Learning & Personal Growth

Next to leadership, outdoor learning and personal growth are of importance as well when it comes to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. Youths are being kept indoors more nowadays, as stated above. Most outdoor activities are being denied or supervised by parents. However, as described by Hopkins & Putnam (1993: 63-86), outdoor education has a lot of benefits for youths. All are related to risks, which can take different forms as described earlier. These risks can occur because of weather circumstances, social anxiety, or when confronting the own self. All will lead to learning, development and personal growth.

The youths will get to share experiences with others, live in a challenging environment, expand personal beliefs, learn teamwork skills, and use personal experiences and knowledge to develop the whole group. All which is important to become successful, to get insight, to become happy and relaxed. The youths need to become more independent and grow their confidence. The way their parents are keeping them inside now does not stimulate this at all. Therefore, it is to be believed that outdoor learning and personal growth are very important in these times, and therefore important values when it comes to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting.

4.1.3        Outdoor Guidance

The last element that is considered of importance when teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting is outdoor guidance. To be a good leader, stimulate outdoor learning and personal growth, outdoor guidance needs to be completed good as well. Youths need to be shown, lead, taught and helped, in order for them to learn something new and develop themselves. Gundersen & Østrem (2007: 67-82) found that, outdoor guidance is a development-oriented activity. With the goal of reflection, afterthought and provide assistance in making qualified choices, which will lead to change and improvement. This is also shown in the facilitator leadership style. Which is about guidance, the leader should show and guide the youths, in order to stimulate outdoor learning and personal growth.

Before starting a trip, personal expectations and definitions of guidance in the outdoors should be discussed with the students. How to reach the goal and which goal is to be reached should be clear as well. The outdoor guide should show how to learn and supervise the improvement and developments. When looking at the different outdoor guidance traditions, the action and reflection method is considered the most important when it comes to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting, since it focusses on developing consciousness, experience and values. The main goal is insight, which is important when it comes to learning and developing an individual. This leads to the conclusion that the product developer leadership style within outdoor guidance is most suitable for teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. It is about engagement, and improvement, which correlates to the action and reflection method.

As described in the previous chapter, an outdoor guide should possess different fundamental communication skills. All which will be important regarding the way the group perceives the guide, the learning process and how well they are able to listen to the outdoor guide. Since the group is consisting of youths, this is of great importance. Youths are one of the easiest groups to get distracted and they do not always listen that well. Therefore, there can be concluded, that outdoor guidance and the way it is handled and perceived is of great importance when it comes to teaching Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life in a school setting. It is a deal maker or breaker.

4.2  Outdoor Life in the Netherlands

Friluftsliv is a term that is not to be translated or found in the Netherlands. It is non-existent, as experienced by the author. There are sports that are being practiced, however, these can be viewed as competitive sports or commercialized activities. Which, as stated by Faarlund, Dahle & Jensen (2007: 393-396), are not to be defined as Friluftsliv. Furthermore, in the Netherlands, no free nature is present. Everything is regulated, camping needs to be done in set places. Furthermore, there are set places for campfires and the forest has regulated walking paths. Therefore, there can be concluded that Friluftsliv is almost impossible to be practiced in the Netherlands, in the way it is constructed right now.

4.3  Importance of Friluftsliv in the Netherlands

Friluftsliv should become possible in the Netherlands or be taught in school. As experienced by the author, the people in the Netherlands are stressed, always busy, struggle to find time and places to relax. This is happening mostly amongst the Dutch students and youths. Therefore, it is incredibly important to teach in Friluftsliv in schools, so youths can practice it during holidays or spare time. As stated by Odden (2008: 69) & Zoglowek (2013: 43-62), Friluftsliv is a stress-reliver, relaxation medication, a way to experience a change from daily life, it gives new strength, a boost, and most important, it lets the person experience freedom. All which is important for people to function, and therefore, will most definitely help the Dutch youths in school. This is experience by the author as well, the experience of Friluftsliv has given a relaxation and peace. Therefore, Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life should not only be taught in a school setting in the Netherlands, but it should also be made possible for the residents to practice Friluftsliv. This will benefit the society mentally and physically.

5.    Summary

The conclusion can be drawn that practicing Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life has a lot of benefits for people. Such as improvement of mental health, strength and personal growth. Norway has the perfect nature and freedom to comply with this. Furthermore, there are four main elements that suit Friluftsliv, leadership, outdoor learning, personal growth and outdoor guidance. All influence the learning experience and the level of personal development. However, Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life are not present in every country. In the Netherlands, there is almost no free nature present, people are stressed and overworked. Therefore, Friluftsliv and Outdoor Life should be taught and be made possible in the Netherlands.

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