Examination of Witnesses (Questions 75-79)
1 NOVEMBER 2004
MS HELEN
WILLIAMS AND
MR STEPHEN
CROWNE
Q75 Chairman: Can I welcome Helen Williams
and Stephen Crowe from the Department for Education and Skills
who have kindly agreed to be here to answer some questions on
what we have called an inquiry into the benefit of outdoor learning.
This is an inquiry that we certainly take very seriously since
three years ago some of us went to look at the Forest Schools
Initiative in Denmark and saw the way in which even at pre-school
the outside environment was used very positively as part of the
educational experience of young children. There has been a whole
number of issues that seemed to suggest that not only was it a
time of change in outdoor learning but there were certain barriers
to either its development or continuation. Stephen Crowne and
Helen Williams, is there anything you would like to say about
your responsibilities? Interestingly enough, when we looked at
your background in the department it did not really point up the
reference and the relevance of outdoor learning to your particular
remit, so perhaps you could illuminate us on that.
Ms Williams: I am a Director within
the Schools Standards Group within the DfES. I am responsible,
among other things, for policy on the national curriculum and
on support for all subjects and themes within the national curriculum,
including outdoor education as a context for teaching and learning
across the curriculum. That is how I come to be here today. The
Department does see outdoor education as being a very important
part of what schools should offer pupils to support a broad and
rich curriculum. We know that some schools do use outdoor education
pretty well but that there are other schools which, for whatever
reason, are not fully exploiting the potential of outdoor learning.
The department's policy is to work with a very wide range of partners
to promote good practice in outdoor education and also to develop
teachers' confidence and knowhow in planning and delivering outdoor
education. We think it is absolutely key to getting outdoor education
fully into the system to convince heads and their staff that
outdoor education has a contribution to make to pupil achievement
and development so that they can build it in at the start into
the curriculum and timetabling.
Mr Crowne: I am Director of the
School Resources Group which is responsible for school funding,
capital investment, school organisation, school admissions, transport
and safety, the last of which is essentially the reason I am here.
My particular interest, as Helen says, is in working with partners
to identify what are the obstacles to outdoor education which
can range across issues of safety but also funding, transport
and so on, to see whether there is more we can do in partnership
to help give a greater sense of confidence amongst all schools
that outdoor education is a central part of the offer and that
there are ways of delivering that offer consistently and with
high quality in all schools.
Q76 Chairman: Thank you. This is a department
that believes in evidence-based policy. Have you got any evidence
that opportunities for outdoor learning are of any value at all?
Ms Williams: There is a considerable
amount of evidence, some of which we refer to in the memorandum
that we sent you. I have not got chapter and verse at my fingertips
but I am sure we can produce a lot of evidence showing that outdoor
education has a contribution to make, for example, in science
and geography and giving pupils first-hand practical experience
of doing things in the wild, as it were, adventure activities
in terms of developing pupils' skills, extending their horizons.
There is quite a body of evidence. Outdoor learning is a very
wide topic. Perhaps that is a point that ought to be made at the
outset. It covers a great variety of things from field work in
geography and biology through to trips to museums or places of
cultural interest through to the Outward Bound activities.
Mr Pollard: And Parliament?
Ms Williams: Indeed, Parliament,
and also we included in outdoor learning community-based activities,
for example, volunteering which we encourage through the citizenship
curriculum. We think that in all of those various areas there
is evidence that, properly planned, outdoor learning can make
a contribution to outcomes, to pupil achievement, but the emphasis
is there on proper planning. It needs to be integrated into the
whole curriculum offer for pupils rather than just being something
done as an optional extra.
Q77 Chairman: Is that one of the problems,
that it is too diverse, that you start looking at this subject
and, as you said, it includes a whole range of activities for
a variety of ages? Where does your responsibility in terms of
age begin?
Ms Williams: I do not think it
is a problem that it is a very rich and diverse field. I think
that is just a fact. My interests in outdoor education span the
full range of the curriculum from the foundation stage through
to Key Stage 4 in a whole variety of subjects.
Mr Crowne: From our perspective
the key thing is that the school needs to be very clear about
how particular activities form part of a rich curriculum for the
pupils involved. In a way it should not be for us to try and lay
down how each style or activity contributes; rather to ensure
that the school is very clear, learning from what works in other
schools and in other contexts and drawing together the best practice.
When we are talking about removing the barriers we are also talking
about encouraging the spread of understanding of how particular
activities support particular curriculum objectives or social
objectives, pastoral objectives and so on, in the school. To repeat
the point, there is a tremendously wide range of activity here
and one where we essentially need to work with a broad range of
partners to ensure that distinctive contributions of each kind
of activity are recognised and integrated in the school's overall
offer.
Q78 Chairman: What I am trying to get
at is that if we do not have a pretty clear focus on what the
value is and what the variety of contribution can be it is quite
difficult for the Department to prompt schools to achieve high
levels of added value for all the age ranges. Is that not the
case?
Mr Crowne: I am very wary of the
Department seeking to distil out as it were, in a kind of salami-slice
way, what distinctively each area contributes because in the end
it is about how the school looks at the curriculum as a whole
and plays to its local circumstances, the particular contexts
it has to work with and feeds those into its overall view of the
curriculum. I think there is a balance in this and where we ought
to be putting our effort is in encouraging and promoting what
the wide variety of partners believe to be the best practice and
giving schools a menu of opportunities from which they can then
select and mould and adapt in the light of their own particular
circumstances.
Q79 Chairman: Should it not be the Department's
job to persuade by the evidence, by good practice, teachers in
training, that this is a priority, that it is something that adds
value to the life of the school and the life of the individual
student? Is that not the level at which you should be taking a
particular interest?
Mr Crowne: It is a very good point
and clearly this process has to start with initial training. The
amount of time available for initial teacher trainees is limited
and all we can expect is to give some basic tools around planning
these kinds of activities. The real value added has to come during
the early period of professional development in post when we should
encourage all teachers to work together to see the benefits that
can accrue from different types of activity and ensure that they
are confident, through continuing professional development, in
taking those kinds of activities forward. It is building the confidence
and the understanding of the potential benefits where you get
the real gains. You have to see it as a seamless development rather
than focus specifically on the initial end.
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