Christian Youth Adventure Camps: Evidencing the Potential for Values-Based Education to THRIVE

Abstract

Outdoor education camps offer adventure programs to schools that deliver camp-based activities that challenge students in various ways. These camps provide students with an opportunity to learn in a natural environment, interact with their peers outside of the classroom, and participate in activities that challenge them both physically and mentally. Youth Adventure Camps also espouse a Christian ethos, Christian values, and spirituality, which are also key focuses. Prior research into outdoor education camps has examined the social, emotional, and physical benefits for students. In this study, data were collected through semi-structured interviews with five (n = 5) Christian Youth Adventure Camp (CYAC) staff to better understand their experiences and perceptions of their induction, ongoing training, strategies, and pedagogical approaches used to deliver the CYAC camp programs. Targeted observations of camp staff (N = 5) in action were also used to identify the intentional pedagogies they used to embed CYAC’s philosophy within their camp programs. This paper is part of a larger study, and its findings are focused on the perspectives of the camp leaders for two key reasons: First, we wanted to examine the intentional pedagogies of camp leaders, particularly those who were not qualified teachers; and second, our aim was to examine how these camp leaders included the values-based THRIVE philosophy in their day-to-day practice. Our findings show that, despite not being university-qualified educators, camp staff consistently employed intentional pedagogies that were effective in engaging students in opportunities to “thrive” in alignment with the philosophy underpinning their operations and to meet the goals of the school using their programs.

1. Introduction

Outdoor education camps are typically designed to challenge students in a variety of ways through adventure curriculum and student-centered, critically mindful pedagogies. Outdoor learning is often situated within a health and physical education curriculum, in which students are connected to “self, place, space, community, and more-than-human life” through intentional pedagogies (Welch et al., 2023, p. 341). There is an associated rationale that adventure-based learning in a natural environment brings about particular social, emotional, mental, physical, and potentially spiritual benefits (Furco, 2023).

In general, school adventure camps are unique settings that provide a range of opportunities for students to experience new and challenging activities, which assist them in developing resilience, building unity, and disconnecting from the day-to-day pressures of school and home life. A key policy imperative affecting camps is the management of risk, which, as Hogan (2002) argued, centers on preventing disability or death (or liability for injuries). Through a variety of guiding principles or “standing orders”, camps generally minimize risk by setting the minimum experience or qualifications of leaders, the minimum and/or maximum number of persons in a group, the maximum number of participants per leader, prior experience of participants, minimum equipment standards, and other sectoral or jurisdictional organizational approval processes (Hogan, 2002, p. 71). Where camps promote a Christian ethos, there are also opportunities to examine spiritual concepts in an encouraging environment.

The literature around outdoor adventure camps posits that these experiences have the potential to change lives (Furco, 2023; Orson et al., 2020). This potential is enhanced for middle years learners (aged 12–16 years) as many opportunities for extended outdoor education experiences (i.e., more than one day) occur during this key developmental period. For these young adolescents, the onset of puberty, rapid changes in their cognitive development, and significant development and consolidation of their social and emotional skills make this a critical juncture and an important time to capitalize on opportunities to support young people in positive ways (Brinegar et al., 2024). A strengths-based approach applies to many aspects of outdoor and adventure education camps and has the potential to positively impact students’ learning and development (Furco, 2023). For example, personal growth through risk-taking, mastery experiences, building resilience, reflection, and the skills and benefits associated with teamwork, such as “reciprocity, group cohesiveness, [and] interpersonal relationships,” has been reported as goals and outcomes of adventure education camps (Passarelli et al., 2010). McKenzie (2021) highlighted that, for many students, the settings for outdoor and adventure camps are unfamiliar and provide them with unique opportunities to gain new perspectives and a positive sense of self as they attempt to master the challenges of new activities and then reflect on these experiences. Further, the incremental challenge posed as students engage in new and often difficult tasks enables them to develop new skills and promotes personal growth and an increasing sense of self-efficacy and resilience as they persist in achieving the goals of the activity (Passarelli et al., 2010).

Although specific activities on camp are often memorable, the camp staff who work with students and guide them through different activities are in a unique position to influence the lives of these young people in ways that few other types of relationships can. Camp staff are often near-peer role models (i.e., often young) and provide support, guidance, and mentoring, fostering students’ social and emotional growth (Wilson & Sibthorp, 2018).

Key to the success of outdoor education adventure camps is to have staff whose personal identity and practices align with these characteristics. One’s personal identity is multifaceted and multilayered, with some characteristics being stable (e.g., race, gender, age) and others being more fluid and variable (e.g., profession, religion, dress), which are influenced by personal choice. One’s personal identity is also inherently social, as individuals need to be part of something greater than themselves, and it influences the conscious decisions that enable them to function effectively within and across contexts (Layder, 2004). Within a work environment, a person’s work identity refers to ‘who a person is at work and how he or she is defined within the context of work’ (Adams & Crafford, 2012, p. 1). Thus, work is an important social context that has a direct influence on the development of one’s identity. When working within a Christian outdoor education adventure camp, how camp staff sees and can present themselves within this context is critical to their effectiveness as they lead the programs. Taniguchi et al. (2009) identified three key characteristics that the young people most admired in camp staff, including having a service orientation (i.e., focusing on the needs of others), having an intentional interest in others (i.e., care and interest in each person as an individual); and being fun-loving and adventurous. Research consistently finds that the greatest strength of camps is the supportive relationships between the students who attend the camp and the camp staff (Garst et al., 2011; Sorenson, 2018).

1.1. Educational Philosophies Underpinning YACs

Youth adventure camps are typically designed around inquiry-based and experiential learning, which aligns with a Deweyan approach based on pragmatism and instrumentalism (Dewey, 1938; Quay, 2016; Quay & Seaman, 2013). In this way, knowledge develops out of trial and error through evaluating the practical consequences of problem-solving and intentional reflection (Dewey, 1916). Kolb’s (1984) work in experiential learning is well-known in outdoor education, whereby he suggests that learning should be cyclical through experiencing, reflecting, thinking, and acting. Like Dewey (1938), Kolb (1984) believed that experience should occur via direct interaction with the environment, whilst Louv (2005) believed that reconnecting children with nature is essential for well-being, healthy development, and environmental stewardship.

Seaman (2019) highlighted how Dewey’s emphasis on culture and historical context provides a framework for understanding how outdoor learning experiences can foster values and contribute to a student’s holistic personal development. Within the context of the CYAC, students’ experiences are mediated by the historical expectations of a youth adventure camp, the social values, particularly the intentional Christian values that underpin CYAC’s THRIVE philosophy, and the resultant intentional practices that are embedded within CYAC’s programs.

The concept of outdoor learning as a core medium for building resilience in children was further developed by Hahn (1964) through the Outward Bound movement. Developing resilience works from Peirce’s principle of “fallibilism” (Peirce, 1903), where human knowledge is always subject to revision and correction. These philosophical notions give rise to the idea of “sequenced failure” (Rohnke, 2000) in outdoor learning, where students are given unique challenges at which they are likely to fail in their initial attempts, combined with opportunities to reflect, trial new solutions and try again until they experience some form of success.

1.2. Values-Based Education in School Camps

When embedded within a school camp curriculum, values-based education provides opportunities to teach students how to enact values whilst explicitly teaching the values in context (Furco, 2023). That is, values-based education emphasizes experiential learning where students can understand and apply values in different contexts (Cam, 2014). Outdoor education camps are unique educational settings where values-based education can be embedded within activities that engage students not just cognitively but emotionally and experientially. Guiding students through and then reflecting on their experiences throughout the camp supports the development of pro-social behaviors and attitudes such as respect, responsibility, and positive relationships (Furco, 2023), social and emotional competencies such as perseverance, resilience, and gratitude (Gomez, 2024), and values related to outdoor education such as environmental stewardship and connecting with nature (Furco, 2023; Gomez, 2024). The Christian youth camp involved in this study had a dedicated commitment to developing the concept of “anti-fragility” in students, a concept widely regarded as being “beyond” or an extension of “resilience” by not only resisting shock but becoming better because of it (Tsai, 2024, p. 1). Three measures of anti-fragility have been proposed by Tsai (2024, p. 1), including “benefit from shock”, “benefit from ambiguity”, and “benefit from stress”. He argued that anti-fragility is a unique construct, loosely associated with but not merely a component of physical or mental health. Thus, for students, anti-fragility is about using the challenges and adversity experienced in camps to become stronger, more adaptable, and more capable.

1.3. Intentional Pedagogies

The concept of signature or intentional pedagogies was coined by Shulman (2005), who argued that unique teaching methods can be attributed to particular disciplines. Such pedagogies are not only concerned with conveying specific instructional content but also social or regulative knowledge that embodies the values, attitudes, and skills crucial to the discipline. That is, within a context, pedagogical approaches are deliberately, thoughtfully, and purposefully chosen to achieve specific goals or outcomes for students’ learning.

Much research has been dedicated to understanding effective pedagogical practices or high-impact teaching strategies that are known to be effective when teaching middle years learners (Department of Education and Training VIC, 2020; Harrison & Bishop, 2021; Hattie, 2012; Main & Whatman, 2023; Tomlinson, 2014).

A key pedagogical approach of adventure camps is for tasks or activities to be “all-in”, where students need to work together as a group to solve challenges, and their successes and failures are taken together, rather than being individually competitive. This collaborative or cooperative pedagogical approach supports the development of social skills such as communication, teamwork, and collaboration (Dyson & Casey, 2016; Richmond et al., 2019). Orson et al. (2020) also found when students participated in challenging activities, peers consistently provided “skillful and responsive on-the-spot support that motivated youth, helped them to succeed, and scaffolded students’ learning strategies for dealing with physical, social, and emotional challenges (p. 15). The key to fully realizing the benefits of these types of activities is the pedagogical approach used by camp staff in their delivery.

2. Materials and Methods

Research Design

The overarching aim for this phase of this study was to identify the intentional pedagogies used by CYAC staff that promoted a values-based outdoor education program and met the developmental needs of young adolescents. The study was situated within the context of a Christian Youth Adventure Camp (CYAC) that provides outdoor education programs for Years 4–12 in both government and private schools across Southeast Queensland and Far Northern New South Wales, Australia. The research site in this study was in an affluent area of Southeast Queensland, and the students who typically attended the camp were drawn from a range of fee-paying private Christian schools and public state schools. Students from private schools may have extra-curricular activities such as adventure campus included in their monthly fees, whereas students from public schools would be required to pay individually to attend such an opportunity. As such, it implies that most students come from a socio-economic background that can support extra-curricular participation with appropriate parental support.

CYAC uses a values-based philosophy called THRIVE that is underpinned by five key pillars: generosity, spirituality, antifragility, gratitude, and relationships as their critical point of difference. The aim of the CYAC programs is to help schools create thriving communities with individuals who understand that “If it is to be, it is up to me.” This mantra reminds students to take personal responsibility and be vulnerable and honest in their communities.

Participants in this study were drawn from the pool of CYAC staff at one of the CYAC’s outdoor education sites. Camp staff work across different locations, with numbers fluctuating depending on student numbers in school groups attending the camp. Information and Consent forms were emailed to all current staff by the CYAC lead teacher. Staff were assured that participation was voluntary and would not affect their employment at CYAC. A total of five (n = 5) camp staff agreed to be interviewed and were available on the afternoon following a camp. The CYAC staff who were interviewed were representative of the broader CYAC staff population and were a purposive and convenience sample.

Data for this study were collected through semi-structured interviews (approximately 30 min) with CYAC staff members (n = 5) and observations (10 × 90 min) of staff (n = 5, i.e., two observations per staff member) during the delivery of a camp program. The semi-structured interviews sought to elicit Camp staff’s education and employment background, their induction and training at CYAC, their understanding of the purpose of camps, and the strategies and pedagogical approaches they used to achieve that purpose. CYAC staff were sent a list of the semi-structured interview questions prior to the interview to provide them time to consider their responses. Examples of the semi-structured interview questions included:

Demographic: Can you tell us a little bit about your background? So, what you’ve done prior to here, how you got involved with CYAC?

Induction: Can you tell me about your induction and training when you first came to work at CYAC?

Purpose of Camp: What do you think the purpose of CYAC is? What is important about outdoor adventure camps?

Effectiveness: What do you do to help achieve the purpose of the camp? What things do you think indicate that you have been successful as a camp leader?

Staff were also invited to email any additional thoughts after the interviews. However, no staff responded to this offer.

All participants in this study were young adults (i.e., aged from early 20s–30s) and reported a strong Christian ethos aligned closely with the camp’s philosophy. All interviewed camp staff were currently working at the youth camp in either a part-time or full-time capacity and had been working there for between seven months and just over three years, with an average of 19.5 months. Camp staff reported varied work backgrounds prior to commencing work at the camp with no prerequisite employment experience necessary, as requisite training, such as canoeing, surfing, and bushwalking qualifications, was provided through on-the-job training.

Interviews were transcribed verbatim by professional transcribers at https://www.rev.com/ (accessed on 20 June 2024). Participants were each assigned a pseudonym to ensure anonymity. Following the six recommended manual coding procedures for reflexive thematic analysis by Braun and Clarke (2019), the research team first familiarized themselves with the data by reading through the produced transcripts and correcting unusual words (such as place names) or omissions not accurately transcribed by the external agency. In Step 2, initial codes were produced. These initial codes included “background”, “prior work”, “recruitment”, “previous studies”, “induction”, “further training”, “self-perceived strengths”, “self-perceived weaknesses”, “self-efficacy”, “camp purpose”, “personal philosophy”, “pedagogies”, “strategies”, “success measures”. Step 3 was to collate these many initial codes into unifying themes, which collapsed a longer initial list into six themes: “Background”, “Induction”, “Purpose”, “Pedagogies/ Strategies’, “Self-efficacy”, and “Success measures”. As Byrne (2021) noted, themes can be hypothesized based on prior theory selected to inform the investigation. Themes may also be generated from working with the data inductively and developed out of these codes. We produced this list of themes as a combination of both approaches, having ‘looked for’ concepts and ideas about self-efficacy, effective evaluation, and pedagogy and deciding upon more themes connected to the background of the participants and what they were doing to be inducted into their practice as camp leaders (Refer to

Table 1. Raw data from initial codes mapped onto six themes.

Interview Data	Initial Codes	Eventual Theme
“I’ve been with CYAC for a year and a half now. I started last year, about February. Beforehand I was doing chaplaincy and residential youth care. I did those for about a year, together. Then that’s when [colleague], who works here, she actually recommended me to try to get a job here. So, I left it for about six months, and then the beginning of last year is when I tried to step in, and then sort of welcomed me with open arms, which is cool. So, I’ve been full-time here since I started.”	Care about young people	Background
“I ended up going in back to studying and studied my diploma of ministry, Christian Ministry, for a year. That was last year. And then just sort of made the call that it was time to go back to some full-time work and volunteer at Red Frog’s during Schoolies *. And so, one of the managers here, she was actually the domain coordinator at Red Frogs, she was one of my leaders and just got talking with her about it and she was like, “Yeah, you should come in and have a look, see if you like it.” [* Schoolies is a week-long end of year celebration for Year 12 students and, as they are often under 18 years of age, community organisations volunteer to keep watch over them in public spaces and give out red frog lollies].	Care about young people	Background

).

These first three steps–generating a codebook—are typical for thematic analysis, but what moves the process into reflexivity occurs in these latter steps (Braun & Clarke, 2019); step 4 involves the reviewers checking each other’s coding and developing a thematic map. Such a map reveals how researchers see the relationships between the codes and opens the possibility of interrogating researcher biases and opportunities to reconfigure. For example, both researchers identify as Christians, are experienced in delivering professional development to educators, and have significant experience and expertise in well-being programs. The researchers have complementary skills, with one being a Health and Physical Education Curriculum expert, with an Outdoor Education degree specialization and employment history, and the other being a middle years’ education/ adolescence and social and emotional skilling expert. Steps 5 and 6 in the reflexive thematic analysis involved further refining and renaming these themes, selecting data to display against the themes, and considering how the researchers’ positionality affects what they were looking for. For example, during observations of camp staff, the language used when discussing events with students changed when they were working with students from a Christian school as opposed to a government school. The message was the same, but the language was different. Identifying as Christians, the researchers were both more attuned to the nuanced changes in language use between school groups. This awareness was important when reporting on the strength of the values-based focus of interactions between CYAC staff and students. Figure 1 shows the initial thematic map drawn from the data analysis stages described in the previous section.

Observations were undertaken within one week in October 2023, where two members of the research team followed five camp leaders independently (n = 5, x2) over several days throughout their rostered activities. Additionally, both researchers took detailed notes, or “thick description” (Carspecken, 1996, p. 45), as a standard ethnographic practice to record speech acts of the camp leaders as close to verbatim as possible and recall the events of the day. These notes were exchanged and read by the two team members to inform and extend each other’s notes and to overlap concepts from the literature as identified from the interviews and camp program documents. The thick notes, written in notebooks, were taken during observations of each camp leader. As children were in attendance in the sessions, and permissions for videography were not available, no audio-visual recordings of day-long camp programs were taken. Hennink and Kaiser (2022) noted that theoretical saturation occurs “at the point in the data collection process when all important issues or insights are exhausted from data” (p. 292). Their systematic review also highlighted that data saturation can be achieved with a small sample size if the participants are a homogenous group. Although the recommended sample size (N = 9–17) was larger than that of the current study, the combination of semi-structured interviews, thick notes, and camp program documents provided rich data that could be triangulated and supported the coding of themes in this study.

Table 2. Thick notes of CYAC camp leader observations.

Notes	Coding
“Hello [school name]. My name is [name]. Who’s excited for camp? Who has been to [camp] before? Look at the window behind you, can you see the national park? This camp has been here for 87 years.”	General motivational, engagement strategy
The leader outlines the program for the day. First, the students will watch the safety induction video, then have some morning tea, then get into groups for cabins. “Thumbs up if you understand? Double thumbs up if you are super excited for camp?” Students are asked to take a toilet break; refill water bottles then return to the room. Some students stay, most take the opportunity.	Signposting what will unfold for students which both motivates and assures students. Prioritising safety
First activity after morning tea in courtyard. “We have a saying at camp—if it is to be, it is up to me. This can mean lots of things. One way it can be is getting ready. It is a personal responsibility. Being on time for activities is on you. Remembering your hat, water bottle, dry shoes, wet shoes etc. is on you. Another way this could play out is when someone might do something that upsets you. It’s up to you how you respond to that. Another way concerns safety. Parents rely on us to keep you safe. But if you’re not doing the right thing, it’s harder for us to keep you safe”. Leader explains that there is an important surf safety video to watch. Plays video, steps just outside but within view of the room to speak to teachers.	Contextualising the THRIVE philosophy for the age group Meeting OECA competencies: safety

provides example excerpts of thick notes recorded during observations.

Table 3. Examples of the intentional pedagogies observed and alignment with CYAC’s THRIVE philosophy.

Observation	Intentional Pedagogy/Example	Alignment with THRIVE Philosophy
Throughout Camp	Carrying equipment and/or food for each other between locations. Being generous with their time and support for each other as they helped and encouraged one another during activities.	Generosity
Day 1 Communal eating & Debrief	Christian schools may say Grace before eating. Leaders may ask, “tell me something you learned today about you, a friend, or God?” Raising students’ awareness of the beauties of the area and God’s creations; recognising themselves as children of God; being reminded that God loves them and has a purpose for them.	Spirituality
Day 1 setting expectations	Leader asks, “Have you tried giant paddle boarding before? Or tubing?”. “Why do you think it is important to try new things?”. Leader asks, “Think about the rewarding feeling, how proud you are of yourself when you push yourself outside of your comfort zone”.	Antifragility
Day 2 activity debrief	After activity session, during afternoon tea. Before receiving the afternoon tea snack, Leader asks, “Tell us one thing you are grateful for?”. A variation of this is, “What was something that one of your classmates did today that you appreciate them for?”	Gratitude
Day 1 setting expectations for camp All camp	Leaders use warm up games to learn everyone’s name quickly and consistently use students’ names. Leaders consistently and deliberately use students’ names; take opportunities to ‘High Five’ students, ask questions, and interact with individuals as much as possible in authentic ways (i.e., chatting when walking, encouraging when doing activities, using humour etc.)	Relationships

provides examples of the intentional pedagogies observed and their alignment with CYAC’s THRIVE philosophy.

3. Results

All interviewed camp staff identified as devout Christians and demonstrated all of the three key characteristics that were most admired in camp staff (Taniguchi et al., 2009). That is, they all reported a strong service orientation (i.e., focus on the needs of others), had an intentional interest in others (i.e., care and interest in each person as an individual), and were fun-loving and adventurous. All interviewed camp staff also had a non-teaching background, which is common in non-government outdoor education centers* (*Outdoor education centers, which are owned by Departments of Education, typically have teacher-qualified staff). Since risk assessment procedures in educational sectors emphasize specific technical expertise to run activities such as bushwalking, canoeing, and other climbing or water activities, CYAC staff had been trained in-house, held technical expertise (such as canoe instructor), and worked with the university qualified teaching staff (teachers) who were accompanying their students and were responsible for managing student behavior (c.f. Department of Education and Training VIC, 2023; Department of Education and Training QLD, 2023).

All CYAC staff self-reported a strong Christian ethos, which aligned closely with CYAC’s Christian values and overarching philosophy. For the most part, camp staff were recruited through the friendship groups of staff members and, most often, through their involvement in a local church youth group. The key to the success of CYAC’s programs is for each camp staff member to understand and implement clearly defined learning intentions together with a process of reflection as a practice of intentional teaching. Intentional teaching emphasizes the teacher’s role in guiding and facilitating learning experiences that include the initial planning of the activity and its associated aims and the implementation of the activity, followed by an assessment or reflection on the learning experience for students.

The pedagogical approaches reported and consistently used by CYAC staff aligned with evidence-based practices for effective learning (Hattie, 2012). In the case of CYAC, the personal background and beliefs of staff meant that the underpinning THRIVE values were also observed as an intentional part of the core values of CYAC and the delivery of a values-based education (Furco, 2023). When asked about the strategies that they used when implementing the CYAC’s programs, camp staff referred to a range of pedagogical approaches, including setting goals, effective communication, modeling, challenging students, reflections and evaluations of activities, and building relationships with students. Each of these approaches will be discussed in turn.

3.1. Goal Setting

The pre-camp information packages sent to schools asked them to advise the camp of the school’s goals for students prior to the camp experience. Regardless of whether the schools specified goals for camp, the camp staff would lead collaborative goal setting with the students at the beginning of the camp experience, not long after disembarking from the bus. All camp staff agreed that goal setting for the school camp, as well as their group and individual activities, was a critical part of their approach. One camp leader reported the importance of setting goals:

[I] always set goals...and if we have that outcome in mind, the process towards that outcome will be so much better, rather than just doing it for the sake of doing it.

A perspective from another camp leader related to the importance of making the learning goals or objectives explicit to students to extend and build friendships and by challenging them even in small ways:

rather than just going on the night beach walk, see it as an opportunity to actually chat to people you don’t usually chat to at school.

Goals also became a mantra for positive reinforcement over the camp. Every time a student ‘strayed’ from behavior for which the camp was intended, the leaders or teachers could say “remember, our goal for camp is resilience”.

3.2. Effective Communication

The intentional pedagogies for effective communication were observed in activity introductions, segues or transitions, and debriefs, where leaders gave students an outline of what they would talk about or do next, how it related to their most recent activity, and how it articulated with their camp goals. When introducing activities, there was a strong focus on safety (Hogan, 2002). For example, prior to a surfing activity, one camp leader explained, “Your parents rely on us to keep you safe. But, if you’re not doing the right thing, I can’t guarantee you will be safe.” Students then watched a surf safety video and were consistently given reminders about aspects of safety. Staff did this in both verbal and nonverbal ways. One example observed was during a surfing activity. The CYAC camp leader needed students to stay within the flagged area to be safe. However, the wind was driving the students north as they came in on their surfboards. The camp leader instructed students that as they came out of the water, they had to come and give him a ‘high five’ before entering the water again. As students did this, the camp leader also praised them for their efforts and occasionally gave feedback on their technique. However, the key to this action was that rather than consistently reminding students that they had to come to the most southern part of the flagged area to re-enter the water (where he was standing), they needed to give him a ‘high five’, effectively ensuring the safety of students through a non-verbal communication model. Activity debriefs were critical for reflection and relying on the CYAC’s communication skills to support the students’ awareness and connection to the learning opportunities (values and goals of camp). See, for example, this exchange between a camp leader and a whole group of year eight students following a surfing activity:

Camp leader: Before I tell you guys the plan for the evening, and before we head back to camp, we are going to have something that CYAC likes to call a debrief or reflection, so we can look back on our activity and maybe think of some highlights and what we think we can learn from it. Before we get started, can anyone remember our three goals for camp?

Student: Having fun!

Camp Leader: Yes,

Student: Teamwork!

Camp Leader: Yes, and what was the last one?

Student: Friendship!

Camp Leader: yes, beautiful. Everyone says, “You are my friend”.

All students: You are my friend!

Camp leader: So, those are our big three values we are focusing on overall for camp. Friendship, teamwork, and having fun. It might be difficult to focus on friendship when we are doing an individual sport like surfing, but hopefully, you had fun surfing with, and crashing into, your friends! One of the other things we really focus on when we do surfing is resilience. So, I want to hear from you guys about some instances when maybe you were hit by a board, or run over by a board. Throw it out there!

Student: I got smashed in the jaw by a board.

Camp leader: Alright. Who thinks they can top getting an uppercut by a board?

[Four more examples were provided by the students of being hit with a board or injured]

Camp leader: So, nearly everyone had an experience of being hit by a board. But, friends, take a look around, we are all still sitting here, we are all still alive, we are having a little giggle, and everything is fine. So, now, we are going to go around the circle, and I want to hear a funny/favorite moment from all of you.

As illustrated above, activity debriefs would become the opportunity to connect real life experiences with camp goals set by the school but also the key pillars of the THRIVE philosophy, which included resilience or anti-fragility, and gratitude.

Camp goals also would become keywords or cues to remind students of what they had accomplished in various activities, as well as what they were heading towards:

We’ll be walking through the national park, and one of the kids will be like, “Oh, man, this sucks.” We’re like, “No, resilience.” It might be a bit of a joke, but at least something’s going on, and it’s like they’re reciprocating that kind of language.(CYAC leader)

When observing CYAC camp leaders, they made a conscious effort to model positive language with the students. One leader described how they used positive language when giving instructions, for example, saying that activity “is going to be a challenge, but we can do it together” (building resilience) rather than saying this hard.

3.3. Modelling

Modeling the behaviors and language (see communication above) that demonstrated the values of the Camp that they were trying to promote with the students was also seen as being intentional by camp staff. CYAC leaders reported that it was important to model both behavior and language for the students. During observations, all camp leaders modeled enthusiasm and passion for the activities to help get students excited and motivated to participate. Linking back to their goals, one CYAC leader noted that they try to “get on the same page” as the students by demonstrating what he wanted to “achieve for the week and having an outcome in mind”. They further explained that it is important for the students to “have fun and [be] driven” during camp activities.

Camp staff felt that it was important to be a role model. One camp leader noted that

for me... it’s leading. My role is to lead by example in front of the kids. Another camp leader noted that

for me, the biggest one would be to lead by example. I think I always touch base with my groups on what it means to be a leader. To me, a leader is someone who does what they want the kids to do before the kids do it so they are in front of them, leading them through the steps.

When observing the CYAC staff, they also participated in many of the activities with the students. One camp leader noted that it “was important for the kids to see me learn and grow as well”.

3.4. Challenging

Many of the activities offered by the Youth Camp are outside of the normal day-to-day experiences of the students. Camp staff saw many of these activities as opportunities for students to be challenged and to grow and had considered pedagogical approaches to capitalize on these experiences and to highlight the different strengths amongst the students.

All camp staff reported having explicit training (such as Certificate qualifications in certain medium to high-risk activities, like surfing) as well as a formalized induction and ongoing mentoring, such as shadowing more experienced staff. Having strong technical expertise in the camp activities aligns with the need for those teaching youth to be experts in their field as students respond more positively to teachers/leaders who can ‘walk the talk’ (Harrison & Bishop, 2021). Different CYAC programs offer a variety of activities depending on the age group (e.g., canoeing, surfing, raft building, giant stand-up paddle boarding). Each activity has its own unique challenges and opportunities beyond learning the technical skills to successfully complete the task. Indeed, the nature of some of the activities was to contrive or “sequence” failure so that the students could experience difficulty, ambiguity, and stress as necessary constructs to develop anti-fragility. One camp leader noted, “You want the kids to figure things out also, so you let them figure it out and do it on their own”. For example, students were asked to make their own rafts. Students were divided into groups and were given the necessary materials to complete the task, but no instructions were provided on the best way to go about it. Students were required to design and build a raft that would float and carry all members of their group. Many of the rafts fell apart before making it to the creek or would split and sink, casting the students into the water. These difficult experiences would generate opportunities for students to communicate their ideas and opinions and speak to each other with varying levels of anxiety, panic, anger, patience, or gratitude, providing further opportunities to reflect on how they individually and collectively handed the challenge. These types of experiences are rarer within the standard classroom and are a unique hallmark of intentional pedagogies for and in outdoor education.

All interviewed camp staff focused on building challenges into the activities they ran. This approach to including ‘challenge’ was deliberate and intended to provide opportunities for students to develop communication skills, build cohesion as a group (relationships), develop anti-fragility, recognize (encourage and support each other), and capitalize on each other’s strengths (generosity), and build self-confidence.

There are so many different activities. You can get to problem solving initiative games, which are completely different to doing something like surfing. They just involve different people in a lot of different ways, and they get the opportunity to share their strengths.

A CYAC leader gave another example that some activities were intentionally designed to show students that they cannot do everything by themselves, developing key skills and values in cooperation:

We do a lot of activities that you couldn’t make it through yourself. There was this mini wall, and you had to get over it, but you couldn’t get over it unless you helped push one person up. [This involved] relationship skills and teamwork, responsibility, independence, perseverance, emotion regulation, and self-confidence.

3.5. Building Relationships

Outdoor adventure camps are able to foster the development of relationships through a number of their common features, such as communal living (sleeping and meals), structured group activities, and the change in routine and pressures from daily life (Wilson & Sibthorp, 2018). Breaking down the social barriers and encouraging all students to interact with each other was a benefit of camps, with one CYAC staff member sharing that “breaking down the barriers just kind of happens...and that is just the difference between camps and school”, meaning that CYAC camp programs intentionally provide a more integrated social environment compared to the structured setting of a school. This type of interaction is further encouraged by targeted strategies described by CYAC staff, such as encouraging students to chat with someone they have not spoken with before or sharing three things about someone they had never spoken to before at school. Debriefs (reflections at the end of activities) provided students with opportunities to share qualities that they noticed in another student, such as being brave or a leader or being strong and persistent. Over the course of the camp, these open dialogues become more natural and more in-depth.

For CYAC camp staff, relationships with students were key to being able to ‘reach’ or ‘work with’ students. Students who attend camp come from a diverse range of backgrounds, and one camp leader noted that “it can be a challenge to cater to the needs of these kids and to create a cohesive camp experience for everyone”. However, they further contended that this difference was “an opportunity [for students] to learn from each other and to build relationships with people from different walks of life”.

Throughout the interviews, all camp staff referred to relationships either by expressing how important they were or by providing examples of how they built relationships with students at different stages of the program. Creating a welcoming environment was mentioned by all staff and continues to be encouraged.

Teachers also commented that coming on camp allowed them to get to know students in ways that differed from their usual encounters in school. They, too, could talk to students at length as they walked between the camp venue and the activities venues, often up to half an hour, to discuss interests and opinions and notice things out of the ordinary about their shared encounters. Mutually experienced encounters are a design feature of experiential outdoor education (Yildiz, 2022).

3.6. Promoting Values

As a key point of difference, CYAC camps explicitly embed and promote the key values of their THRIVE Philosophy. All of the camp leaders expressed their own commitment to Christ and a strong desire to share the ‘love of God’ with students. One of the teachers explained that, while CYAC has a Christian foundation, “the camps don’t push religion on the kids, and that there are often more students at the camps who don’t go to church than those who do”. They further noted that their goal is “to make sure that the kids are having fun and that they are engaged in the activities” and that it was through challenging them and guiding them that they could help students learn and grow. One camp leader who had been working at the CYAC for several years commented that it was a deliberate strategy for CYAC to move away from more traditional camp structures, such as set activity rotations, to a more fluid approach where activities are tailored to the interests of the schools and the skills of the staff, in effect, making their programs “more bespoke”. This approach aligns with Dewey’s work, where the historical and cultural positioning of CYAC’s THRIVE philosophy is being deliberately and explicitly embedded in the day-to-day practices of staff, facilitating a strong emphasis on the key values of generosity, spirituality, antifragility, gratitude, and relationships.

Facilitating reflections through their debriefing sessions at the end of each activity was key to having students think about what they had learned, how it applied to their participation in the activity, and how it could be applied to their own lives in the future. One CYAC leader explained that they used open-ended questions to encourage discussion and critical thinking. Debriefing sessions almost always involved students reporting back on something that they had learned, something that they had observed about another person or something that they were grateful for.

4. Conclusions

Outdoor adventure learning camps promote student participation in a variety of novel and challenging activities as a measure of success. That is, the overarching goal is for students to develop and demonstrate ‘hard or technical’ skills to complete each activity. In contrast, as a point of difference and by design, in addition to the requisite hard skills, the CYAC’s focus was to overtly promote the development of students’ soft skills such as anti-fragility, gratitude, meaningful relationships, generosity, and spiritual awareness, as a part of their over-arching THRIVE philosophy. This study revealed that despite not being trained teachers, camp staff used a number of intentional pedagogies when working with the middle-year learners who attended the camps. These intentional pedagogies were designed specifically for learning in the outdoors but also enacted by camp staff who also have a personal identity strongly aligned with the core values of the CYAC THRIVE philosophy (i.e., generosity, spirituality, antifragility, gratitude, and relationships). The personal values and beliefs held by camp staff were evident in the focus that they placed on building relationships with students to enable them to ‘reach’ them and have a positive influence during the time they spent together at camp.

The personal commitment of CYAC staff to the THRIVE philosophy positively influenced their interactions with students. Camp staff consistently adapted their approach to foster a balance between the technical skills necessary for the activity and values-based pedagogies. The deliberate and successful focus on values-based pedagogies within CYAC programs demonstrates opportunities lost in many outdoor education programs. In many outdoor education settings, gaining the technical skills associated with specific activities and pushing students outside of their comfort zone are the key purposes for activities. Little, if any, focus is given to promoting pro-social values or personal values through guided reflective processes. For students, the development of these values represents key 21st-century skills that are transferable to other contexts. At CYAC, the Youth Camp staff modeled and facilitated challenging experiences and reflective episodes that were specifically designed to provide opportunities for these middle-year students to reflect on the values embedded within the camp’s program in meaningful and lasting ways.

5. Future Research

Participants in this project were staff who worked at a large CYAC organization with five campsites across Southeast Queensland and Far Northern New South Wales. Further research is necessary to examine how values-based pedagogies can or could be used in outdoor education sites, both non-Christian and other Christian youth camps. Research examining the long-term impacts of values-focused outdoor camps on students compared to those with a more traditional focus on technical skill development and whether middle-year students perceive and internalize the values promoted by the CYAC’s THRIVE philosophy would also be worthy of consideration.