Survival Skills Saves Lives - Tips for School Camps and School Excursions

Lessons learned during school camp, school excursions and school activities can equip children with life-long survival skills and practical know-how that will stand them in good stead well beyond the school gate.

While it's true that learning about the skills needed to survive in the bush or in the water can be fun, what matters more is the power it will give children to take action not only to save their own lives in a threatening situation, but perhaps also somebody else's.

Australian summers see hundreds of thousands of families descend on our coastline beaches to enjoy surf, sun and sea. Though many will swim at patrolled beaches, according to Surf Educate Australia (SEA), 97 per cent of Australian beaches have no lifeguard or lifesaver service. Add to that the kilometres of unpatrolled inland waterways, rivers and lakes where families also congregate to escape the summer heat. Without flags or guidance from lifeguards, swimmers must fall on their own resources if they get into trouble.

Studies have shown the majority of Australians cannot identify a rip current – second only to severe heat as the most dangerous natural hazard in Australia, with one person drowning every three days in a rip current during summer, according to SEA.

Statistics like these make surf education and skills training as critical to learning and development as the 'three Rs', something recognised by former surf ironman champion Craig Riddington in 1998 when he established SEA with the aim of instilling "an aquatic survival instinct in Australian youth".

Since then, more than 250,000 have completed SEA's health, safety and environmental educational programs. Rip currents, how to identify them and how to survive them is an important area of focus in SEA's schools programs, which combine classroom studies with beachside practical demonstrations. All are developed in line with the NSW school syllabus.

"Our key roles are to reduce accidental drowning, to keep Australians healthy and active, and to provide awareness of coastal geography & environmental education," says Riddington.

'Surf Skills & Education', for example, is a 4-hour surf education and activity program that includes a practical demonstration of rip identification and survival, with the advanced course including how to escape a rip on a foam surfboard.

The 6-hour 'Surf Survival' program, meanwhile, combines surf education with still water skills evaluation, surf survival and self-rescue skills, rip identification, basic first aid and basic rescue in moderate surf conditions.

Organisations such as Royal Life Saving, established in 1894, also contribute to Australia's long history of water education.

As Australia's leading water safety, swimming and lifesaving education organisation, Royal Life Saving believes that a quality swimming and water safety program should extend throughout a child's schooling. It's a belief they put into practice through their school and community programs designed "to build awareness of dangers in aquatic environments and to arm the community with lifesaving skills used in both prevention and rescue".

Since 1982, nearly 10 million Australians have taken part in Royal Life Saving's 'Swim and Survive', a national water safety program for 5 to 14 year olds that aims to reduce drowning numbers by fostering knowledge and understanding of water safety skills, while promoting responsible fun in and around water.

The program, which caters for all abilities, offers a broad, balanced line up of swimming, water safety and survival skills, with children awarded with certificates at each developmental step. The early levels provide opportunities to build confidence and respect for the water, while the upper levels prepare the child for the increased complexity of their relationship with aquatic environments,

The program is supported by a range of teaching and classroom resources, including links with the national and state curriculum profiles Australian wide, posters, lesson plans and activity sheets, all available free of charge from the Royal Life Saving website.

Almost as important as learning skills to cope with Australia's abundant waterways and coastline are learning the skills to cope in Australia's bushland.

Australia Walkabout Park, on the northern outskirts of Sydney, is set on 170 acres of old growth forest, where Indigenous animals "from the tiniest insects to giant emus and everything in between" roam free. Among the park's extensive range of curriculum-based and tailored educational programs is a two-hour 'Bush Sense' tour, suitable for old ages, with a focus on basic bush skills and Indigenous awareness. The course covers bush tucker and medicine, finding water and shelter, signalling for rescue "and other important information to give someone an edge in the bush".

Elsewhere, Bindaree Outdoors, an outdoor education provider based in Victoria for the past 25 years, goes a step further to test students' bush skills with an overnight excursion called 'Survival'.

'Survival' places groups in the bush with minimal equipment for a night, "to really get back to nature". The aim of the exercise, says Bindaree, is for the group to construct a shelter, feed themselves and 'survive' in the bush overnight. Essentials are provided.

Survival is one of many outdoor education programs Bindaree offers to schools, which include raft building, rope courses, bush walking and team building. All are designed to introduce "a variety of recreational skills through experiential learning, promoting challenge, leadership and group co-operation". Run by fully trained outdoor professionals, all Bindaree Outdoors programs are individually crafted to meet each school's curriculum aims and objectives.

The outcomes of the Survival overnight excursion are wide and varied, says Bindaree, "but it brings the group back to the basics of surviving without the things we take for granted in the modern world".

Australia's recent experience of bushfires, have put the importance of community education about bushfire awareness under the spotlight – and not for the first time.

A National Enquiry on Bushfire Mitigation and Management released in 2005 noted that successive enquiries – since at least the 1939 Stretton Royal Commission in Victoria – had made recommendations about the importance of bushfire education at both school and community levels:

The enquiry also noted the 1939 Commission's suggestion "that in every school (the education of city children is as important as that of country children), fire prevention be made a real part of the curriculum and that the lessons in that behalf be given at the commencement of the summer season".

Not 70 years' after the 1939 Commission concluded that "knowledge of 'living with bushfire' should be one of the life skills all Australian children acquire during their schooling, wherever they are educated," Victoria fell in the path of catastrophic bushfires yet again in February 2009 with devastating loss of life and property.

There are few formal bushfire education activities in Australia, but Victoria's Dandenong Ranges National Park's 'Fire in the Environment' activity program is one rare exception that enables students to learn about the impact of fire in a natural setting outside the classroom.

The park's description of 'Fire in the Environment' states that Victoria ranks behind California and the French Riviera as a habited high-fire risk area: "in the Dandenong Ranges fire is essential to the park's diversity of flora and fauna, and each year fire is used to reduce fuel loads to minimise the impact of bushfires on life and property".

The 'Fire in the Environment' program is conducted in the park's dedicated education centre, where visiting students view images of recent fires across the state, discuss fire behaviour, strategies for fighting fire, and how the landscape, flora and fauna recover from fire.

Taking advantage of the park's diverse forest types, ranging from cool temperate rainforest, tall Mountain Ash forests and dry shrubby forests, students conduct follow-up field studies to examine what it means to live in such a high fire risk area and what is done to protect neighbouring homes and properties. Fuel assessments can also be conducted at various sites to determine fire risk.

The Dandenong Ranges National Park program is specifically designed to meet Parks Victoria's organisational and park management objectives, and the curriculum requirements of the Curriculum and Standards Framework (CSFII) / Victorian Essential Learning Standards (VELS Levels 1 – 6) and Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) studies.

But learning to survive is not always about overcoming extremes. Just plain old every day existence can have its share of challenges. One Sydney father convinced of the importance of providing children with strategies for overcoming adversity is Sydney father Ken Marslew.

After the violent murder of his 18-year-old-son Michael in a bungled arm robbery in 1994, Ken set up anti-violence organisation Enough is Enough "to offer a practical and proactive approach to addressing conflict and dealing with violence and anti-social behaviour".

Enough is Enough provides a range of award-winning school programs spanning kindergarten to secondary years under the umbrella of the "Peacemaker" project, with a focus on responsibility and a non-violent approach to life.

The Peacemaker project includes programs covering anti violence, strategies to deal with bullying, harassment, emotional management, resilience, responsibility and leadership – all offering a practical and proactive approach to addressing conflict and dealing with violence and anti-social behaviour.

'Your life and your responsibility' uses the real life story of a senseless act to encourage students to focus on personal responsibility, overcoming adversity, facing fear, maintaining self control, building inner strength and resilience and developing leadership skills.

'Stress and anger management' looks at signs and feelings of anger, as well as the thought processes behind them. Students learn strategies for defusing conflict, managing anger, stress release and maintaining self control.

'Goal Setting and achieving' teaches students how to use the power of vision, develop a strategy, use measuring tools and maintenance techniques to create goals. Students leave with a specific goal in mind and a plan to achieve it.

There are other programs too – anti-bullying, road awareness and safe celebrating risk management. Judging by the many positive testimonials on the Enough is Enough website, Ken Marslew, has clearly discovered a need that educators are keen to fill and students equally keen to discover.

For information about Surf Education Australia (SEA), visit:
www.seaaustralia.com.au/index.php

For information about Royal Life Saving, visit: www.royallifesaving.com.au

For information about Australia Walkabout Park, visit:
www.walkaboutpark.com.au

For more information about Bindaree Outdoors, visit www.bindaree.com/index.php

For information about the Dandenong Ranges National Park in Victoria, visit the Parks Victoria Education website at:
www.parkweb.vic.gov.au/education/index.cfm:

For information about Enough is Enough visit:
www.enoughisenough.org.au/home/

"'Goal Setting and achieving' teaches students how to use the power of vision"