~ ~>> S I T E F I N D E R ~ ~ Vol 2 Issue 4 ~ ~ ISSN 1465-8224   ~ ~>> A FEAST FOR THOUGHT [site reviews]   ~ ~>> Adventure and Experiential Education Directory Ezine   ~ ~>> your free monthly newsletter associated with the SiteFinder Directory: <www.reviewing.co.uk/sitefinder/> edited by Roger Greenaway < roger@reviewing.co.uk >   You are receiving this free monthly newsletter either because you subscribed [thank you] or because a friend has forwarded it to you [thank them - check the message header].   You are in control of your subscription. Details are at the end. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> Editor: IT'S YOUR TURN NEXT TIME   At last I have found what I have been looking for. You will probably know that this is the question I have been asking - both for my own interest and for your benefit:       ''HOW and WHY are people are using outdoor adventure     for learning, growth, development, empowerment, education,     training, therapy, reflection or inspiration?''   I was convinced that someone somewhere on this huge internet would sooner or later be sharing their learning about outdoor adventure with the rest of us.   I have introduced you to many people who are doing so, but the two sites reviewed in this issue have gone well beyond any others I have found - in their COMMITMENT to sharing their ideas with the wider world.   They are also both sites that have only just appeared. Strictly speaking they are both new 'micro-sites' within well established sites.   This issue is bigger than previous ones - partly because the mailing service provider has just increased the maximum allowable size of a message from 10k to 100k - partly because reviews of big sites take up a lot of space - but mainly because the style of the two sites could not be more different. The contrast is very interesting. You are bound to like one of them. I like both!   ** I also hope that you will write in with your own views if you visit one of these sites.**  [I confess that I had to do a lot of skim-reading and have really only reviewed what jumped out at me - I'll be going back to both sites to spend more time on each.]   IT'S YOUR TURN NEXT TIME - not only is this an invitation for you to comment on the sites reviewed in this issue. It is also an invitation to all 246 of you to do some self-promotion. I allowed myself a 15 line advert in this issue - for an open training workshop in the UK. You can do the same in future issues - just once but for FREE!   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> SITE REVIEW 1   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Outward Bound Australia: a summary of 30 years of research ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The brand new research section of this site is well hidden, but once you get there, the indexing and organisation of the material is excellent. I'd like to follow their good example and provide you with a useful index for the site review that follows:   OBA - What You Will Find OBA - How to Get There OBA - How to Find Your Way Around (once you are there) OBA - The Research Report (OBA's overview) OBA - Digging Deeper - Roger's Review Comments OBA - Coming Soon on the OBA Australia site ...   ~> OBA - WHAT YOU WILL FIND   Abstracts, publication details, commentaries, and keywords for over 60 books, journal articles, theses, conference papers, and monographs.   Compared to Simon Priest's eXperientia site now at http://www.tarrak.com this site describes many more studies. The eXperientia site describes 25+ studies of corporate adventure training provided by many different organisations. This Outward Bound Australia site describes 60+ studies. Most (but not all) are about Outward Bound, but the studies cover a much wider range of course populations, and include a greater variety of research styles.   There is an understandable emphasis on Outward Bound ...       ''For many people, what can be seen, heard, felt....is what     Outward Bound is really about. For other people more tangible     evidence is necessary.''   ... but many of the studies are of wider interest. Where studies are relevant to a wider audience, this is usually stated clearly.   ~> OBA - HOW TO GET THERE   Start from the home page at www.outwardbound.com.au you will first need to find COURSES at the top of the page, then find RESEARCH at the bottom of the page, then use the index on the left of the page.   WAIT - you may want to read this review first!   ~> OBA - HOW TO FIND YOUR WAY AROUND   TO BROWSE Most studies have both abstracts and commentaries. I recommend the COMMENTARIES - they highlight the implications of each study in relatively plain language.   TO SEARCH FOR KEY WORDS A search box would be helpful. I know there are interesting studies on GENDER on this site, but without a search box/engine for the research section of this site, the quickest way to find them is to visit each page and use the browser's 'Find' tool (CTRL+F) on each page.   TO SEARCH BY THEME The 60+ studies are grouped by their themes:     General Programs     Special Programs     Management Programs     School Programs     Challenge Programs (17 to 30 year olds)     Adult Programs (over 30 years old)     Other     Research Report [see next]   TO VIEW SELECTED HIGHLIGHTS See my review below.   ~> OBA - THE RESEARCH REPORT     ''WHAT THE RESEARCH REALLY SAYS''   This 'Research Report' provides a quick graphical overview (based on 96 studies) giving brief answers to questions such as:       Does Outward Bound Really Work?     Do the effects last?     Are all OBA programs equally effective?     Are OBA's effects equally strong in all areas?   [BROWSING TIP: to see the whole graphs without sideways scrolling, re-find the page in your history folder, click the link and close your history folder. This works with IE5 and maybe with other browsers. It also saves your phone bill - if you pay.]   Outward Bound Australia programs have been shown to positively impact on:       Academic Performance     Adventurousness     Androgyny     Coping Skills     Emotional Control     Hardiness     Leadership Ability     Mood     Motivation     Open Thinking     Optimism     Personal Control     Physical Self-concept     Self-concept     Self-confidence     Self-discipline     Self-efficacy     Self-esteem     Self-perceptions     Self-regulation     Social co-operation     Social Skills     Assertiveness     Taking Initiative     Teamwork     Time Management     Well-Being   From the OBA summary:   ''Comparisons with other types of intervention and outdoor programs demonstrate that OBA are particularly impressive. The strongest outcomes of all are for Outward Bound's 22-day Challenge courses, while even the smallest outcomes for Schools courses are stronger than the average outcomes for outdoor education.''   ''OBA appears to have different effects in different areas, working most powerfully on participants' ability to manage their time and their self-confidence.''   ~> OBA - DIGGING DEEPER - ROGER'S REVIEW COMMENTS   The fact that Outward Bound Australia has such a high commitment to research (96 studies since 1969) is impressive. So is the willingness of OB Australia to share these studies with the wider world - even more so with this latest web publishing initiative.   Equally impressive, of course, is the fact that the research so clearly demonstrates the effectiveness of Outward Bound Australia courses - across a whole battery of tests and in comparison with other kinds of provision.   Some of the comparisons are with other kinds of outdoor provision. Others are with less physical approaches. For example, one reported finding is that:   ''Overall, for self-concept change programs, the evidence suggests that physically-based interventions such as Outward Bound, summer camps, and physical fitness programs are more effective than cognitive, behavioural and other therapies.'' (Hattie, J.M., 1992).   What is not clear to me, is just how these ''outcome studies'' lead to improvements in practice. It is claimed that:   ''Profiling of outcomes provides the designers of OBA programs with vital diagnostic feedback about how to adjust and improve program quality.''   It would be interesting to see more information about this process happens i.e. how research influences practice.   I have yet to be convinced that ''outcome studies'' provide much useful guidance about HOW TO improve programme quality. If you want to find out HOW TO do something better, the most useful source of guidance and inspiration will surely come from studying HOW it works?   One study does get close to the 'HOW' by looking at the effects and desirability of ''inspirational readings'' on an Outward Bound course. The conclusion was (more or less) that readings are desirable but ineffective. In the words of the researchers:   ''The study implies that readings may be an enjoyable part of Outward Bound courses but that they may not contribute to personal development.''   Does that mean farewell to readings?   The problem with using such findings to influence programme design is that other OBA studies highlight the degree of variability within any course population (and presumably the need for more flexible programmes??). For example, a study of mood states (by Fry and Heubeck) emphasises "the fundamental importance of taking into account individual differences in personality".   The GENDER studies come up with some interesting findings about variability, but it is not clear whether or how these might influence programme design.   A study by L. Owens noted:   ''The findings support the Outward Bound program as being equally effective for both males and females. However, the intervention effect was differentially interpreted with males identifying increased physical activity and females identifying improved stress coping and social relationships as the primary benefits.''   J.T. Neill's study of Gender found that:   ''...research on outdoor education program outcomes shows that higher gain scores tend to be found for females.'' ''Outdoor education can no longer naively carry on thinking that optimal personal growth is being achieved for males, nor can be said that outdoor education is meeting the needs of a wide range of females.''   There are some provocative ideas in James Neill's study - that leave me wondering whether practitioners should expect to find ANSWERS from researchers. Perhaps we should expect researchers to ask the questions and practitioners find the answers? And why not? Practioners should, after all, regularly question their practice, and good research can help them to ask some provocative and constructive questions.   You will appreciate this point even more when you get to Site Review 2 (below).   ~> OBA - COMING SOON ON THE OB AUSTRALIA SITE ...   The abstracts and commentaries are concise and informative, but some are much too brief to be of value in this concise format e.g.   ''Feelings of success increased significantly between the top of the abseil and the bottom.''   ... while others are extremely tantalising - especially the more descriptive studies that cannot be so readily summarised (such as those by L.M. Scherl)   I hope that having got this far, that Outward Bound Australia will very soon take their next intended step:       ''We hope that this may be of use to the OE/EE community and     plan sometime in the future to have some of the texts     available online.''   OBA have already done the hard work - doing the 96 research studies and now creating an excellent web design within which to showcase 60 of them. The next step is the easiest - it takes only a few mouse clicks to convert research studies into web pages. Let's hope the generosity of Outward Bound Australia continues!   ====================================================   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> SITE REVIEW 2   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Adventure College Tornio - Steve Bowles' pages ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~   This REVIEW is followed by an INDEX and then by QUOTES.   ~> TORNIO - REVIEW   The three main pages in English on this site are BIG in every sense. Together they currently contain 13 articles, large and small. I can't imagine myself sitting at a campfire reading these pages - as Steve suggests in his warm introduction (below). I don't have a glow in the dark laptop computer, Steve. And I lack the imagination to see my office as a campfire. At a campfire I would rather lift my eyes up from the texts and join in the 'Lets make experience dance' (referred to at the end of this review) .   BIGNESS is the point of these pages. Steve thinks BIG. His time frame is not the last decade or two, but stretches back to Aristotle, Socrates and Co., and even when Steve is quoting from more recent literature and research, his sources are scattered far and wide - around Europe and beyond.   BIGNESS is also about finding SPACE in the outdoors. There is a strong sense in Steve's writings that we only see the space that we carry with us. It's as if the computer motto 'rubbish in, rubbish out' is a universal one that applies to wilderness trips too. (Ralph Waldo Emerson said it better - something about needing to take ''wealth'' on your travels if you want to bring some back.) Steve is particularly keen that we do not take the CLASSROOM or the OFFICE into the outdoors, and he is forever wary of ''CONFORMIST PROGRAMMINGS''.   If Steve's writings work, they will encourage visitors to his web pages to step out of their boxes so that they can enter a BIGGER world and see the boxes they are in. This may be especially difficult for people working in Outdoor Adventure Education - many of whom see it as their job to get other people out of THEIR boxes. You just have to work even harder at thinking BIGGER. Maybe.   This is the value of publishing and browsing on the world wide web. It brings more people into contact with alternative views. OAE in Finland is not the same as OAE in the USA and the UK - as Steve makes clear. He invites us all to the warmth of the campfire. Choose your distance carefully - it's a BIG fire. And it is full of passion.   Thank you Steve for recognising that the web is world-wide and that your work with your students does indeed have plenty of relevance - especially because it's a different voice - a voice closer to the spirit of adventure than many who now write on the subject.   This is how the Adventure Education pages at Adventure College Tornio begin ...   Kirvesvartta Päivää & Good day to You!   Mission (Im)possible...   Through lonely Taiga and Tundra, Rambling around with the Lapland Fells...searching for the truths of life .... ..human-being and be-coming. Sometimes training with technical skills and adventure education.... At other times just "being at home" with the world.( im)Possible or not? This is part of our mission statement. Come and find your answers through others and through the mix with the elemental !   < Adventure..such a interesting word. What does it mean? From these pages you can get lot of information about adventure, and outdoor adventure education. Of course adventure is much more that this, but nobody can tell it all... so please, dream yourself sitting with the camp fire, read these pages, with time and enjoy and send some feed back to us if you feel like it and want to know more.   The pages by Steve Bowles seem to be the only ones in English. Translations of more of the Finnish pages are on their way. Most of these pages are now at archive org   ~> TORNIO - INDEX   Steve Bowles' pages are presented in three sections:   BARE-BONES lecture-texts are for students to play with. They are short and provocative. They are texts to "urge onwards".       Which way from Colin Mortlock? And Why?     Singing the map and map making songs with OAE today     Interview text for Adventure Educational Journal in April-99   SPECIAL TEXTS include many interesting articles from Steve.       Wilderness Therapy     Lakeland way in English (lot of nice stories from Steves book)     Quality Work with Young People  - Developing Social Skills and Diversion from Risk     Memories (from Guide to Issues and Trends in Adventure Education today)     Adventure Education- a search for meaning and definition     Outdoor Adventure Education and experiential learnings in a european context today.   GORE-TEXTS are alternative adventure texts, like stories from Norway.       The Cormorants of Utröst (old Norwegian story)     Fatu-Hiva (part of that book)     Adventure versus the mountain (1984)     The Stampede Trail   ~> TORNIO - QUOTES   Quotes from: Interview text for Adventure Educational Journal in April-99   ''The outdoors is a gender-site. It is, of course, many others things as well. One thing it is not is a site for re-producing the classroom or the office itself and here lies one aspect of confrontation, which leads into the existential arena. The outdoors provides a sense of SPACE that is different through its very structure of social action. Time and place is linked to "space", that is, and who ever knows what happens there? It all becomes, as I have written elsewhere, a "Maybe-World" of "May-Being". How much more of the existential can we get here? Just how much fragmentation can we really take? ... ''The existential times and places are spaced with a freedom for all - that much is sure and again that is why certain attempts at conformist programmings seem to dislike this immeasurable quality preferring to measure the quantity, that is. ... " Long long time ago. I can still remember, before the music died that is, my friend Emil Sinclair going on his walk-a-bouts. He was older and wiser than I was but that was ok. I found my place wandering about too. Let me tell you about a story he wrote one day - "Ever since I was a boy I have been in the habit of disappearing now and then, to restore myself by immersion in other worlds. My friends would look for me and after a time write me off as missing. When I finally returned, it always amused me to hear what so called scientists had to say about my absences, or twilight states. Though I did nothing but what was second nature to me ... those starnge beings regarded me as a kind of freak; some thought me possessed; others endowed me with miraculous powers. " Emil Sinclair was nice to speak with as you can see. (Hermann Hesse ... as Emil Sinclair from Bowles 1998/9)   AND FINALLY ... There is a page of songs (complete with guitar chords) http://web.archive.org/web/20020203071101/www.ppopisto.fi/Users/adventure/steve.htm Many of the songs have the words rewritten with adventure education themes. It is a page by and for ex-students - including a song and dance routine that puts theory in perspective ...   Let´s make experience again Let´s make experience again   (Experience dance: >) It´s just a jump to the left and a step to the right put your hands on your hips and get together tight and only endless theory will really drive you insane Let´s make experience again Let´s make experience again   http://web.archive.org/web/20020203071101/www.ppopisto.fi/Users/adventure/steve.htm Kirvesvartta Päivää & Good day to You!   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> NEW SITES in SiteFinder Directory ~ ~ ~ ~ www.reviewing.co.uk/sitefinder/   Dave Horrocks Scottish Voyageurs SAHA/SCA/HOST scotvoyg@netcomuk.co.uk http://www.scottish-voyageurs.co.uk [dead link?] Anyone interested in adventurous JOURNEYS a vehicle for education, training or recreation For details about a UNIQUE vehicle for outdoor education and training Background info on VOYAGEUR canoes and details of where we go and how we use them What's special are these BIG canoes! We love to co-design programmes to meet required outcomes.   Pam Nichols Arete Adventures AEE, ACCT Pam@areteadventures.com http://www.areteadventures.com Any human who wants a more creative, better life To experience an innovative approach to creating more of what you want in your life or business Our philosophy, list of programs and a visual tour! GREAT web site showing how we are experts at what we do!   Shouting at the Sky ferguson@wtp.net http://www.wildwords.net "Readers interested in a great book about wilderness therapy in the U.S." Excerpts, reviews, and discussion of the issues   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> IN THE NEXT ISSUE (Maybe!) What there wasn't time or space for in this one: ~ New Sites on the web (lots to tell you about!) ~ Trackers' Tips: ~ Site Owners' Tips ~ Prize Winner announcement ~ The SiteFinder portal (still under construction) ~ Readers' comments: ** If you visit one of the sites reviewed in this issue, please write in with your comments.**   CONTENTS (TOP) ~ ~>> TRAINING WORKSHOP ~ ~ ~ Find out what the editor does for a living!   TOOLS FOR REVIEWING IN OUTDOOR MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT Most of my training workshops are provided as part of a client's in-house staff development programme. Here is a rare open workshop that provides opportunities for individuals, freelance trainers, staff development officers etc. to experience a live workshop! - thanks to XCL: ''Ordinary People doing Extraordianry Things''.     ''Tools for Reviewing in Outdoor Management Development''     Saturday 19th to Sunday 20th June 1999     Nantwich, Cheshire, England     provided by Roger Greenaway, hosted by XCL Details: www.reviewing.co.uk/outdoor/omdxcl.htm or request a leaflet from: woodvined@cix.co.uk Full List of 20 workshops: www.reviewing.co.uk/_wkshops.htm [reviewing skills for working with young people and with adults]