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- Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming With Field Handbook
Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming With Field Handbook
by Simon Priest and Michael Gass
448 Pages
Some books address outdoor leadership; others focus on adventure programming. None delve into the specifics of both topics like Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, does.
The first edition of this book helped define the body of knowledge for an emerging profession. Two editions later, this groundbreaking text—now in full color—provides adventure leaders with the tools and evidence they need to show that their outdoor programs are effective and have a lasting impact on their participants.
Internationally renowned authors Simon Priest and Michael Gass have significantly updated the content, based on the latest research, issues, and trends in the field of adventure education and leadership. They have reorganized chapters to conform to their new model of building core competencies. In addition, this third edition includes the following features:
• Material on technology, social justice, cultural adaptation, sustainability, and facilitation techniques
• An online instructor guide that offers activities, discussion questions, and assessments compiled from a group of acclaimed instructors
• A digital field handbook that offers quick reference to key models, concepts, and checklists covered in the text
• An expanded version of global perspectives, valuable for long-standing programs as well as those just beginning to enter the field
Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming details both the art and science of adventure leadership, helping a new generation of outdoor leaders develop their skills. The text extends the focus on evidence-based models, theories, and best practices, showing that science and research are as important to the profession as the natural beauty of the environment.
The book describes the core competencies of outdoor leadership, providing a framework that helps leaders connect with participants in meaningful ways, based on mutual goals. The focus on the science side is invaluable to new leaders and less-experienced leaders, and it is a great refresher for leaders with more experience.
This new edition offers a more detailed look at diversity and cultural competencies, preparing leaders to effectively manage diverse populations of participants. In addition, the content is in line with the updated accreditation standards from the Association for Experiential Education.
The opening chapters of Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming supply a solid foundation in the research, philosophy, ethics, and history of outdoor leadership. Numerous chapters explore the skills leaders need, with topics that include technical activity, safety and risk management, environment, organization, instruction, and facilitation. The authors also examine leadership styles and conditional leadership issues, communication, sound judgment, decision making, problem solving, and the trends and issues in adventure programming.
Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming will help readers understand the four adventure program areas—recreation, education, development, and therapy—and how they influence the delivery of outdoor leadership. The book is a valuable resource for the training and education of future outdoor leaders. It will help readers know why they should work in the profession and understandd how they can make a difference by being an effective outdoor leader.
Introduction
Chapter 1: Evidence
Chapter 2: Philosophy
Chapter 3: Professonal Ethics
Chapter 4: History
Chapter 5: Technical Activity Skills
Chapter 6: Safety and Risk Skills
Chapter 7: Environmental Skills
Chapter 8: Organizational Skills
Chapter 9: Social Psychology
Chapter 10: Conditional Leadership
Chapter 11: Communication
Chapter 12: Instructional Skills
Chapter 13: Facilitation Skills
Chapter 14: Decision Making
Chapter 15: Problem Solving
Chapter 16: Sound Judgment
Chapter 17: Trends and Issues
Conclusion
Appendix: Therapeutic Applications
Glossary
Index
Both Simon Priest and Mike Gass are subject matter experts in outdoor leadership, adventure programming, and the facilitation of learning and change. They have separately authored hundreds of publications, presented thousands of experiential workshops, and delivered dozens of keynote addresses for conferences. They have taught in more than 60 nations around the world, and they enjoy collaborating on scholarly endeavors and climbing mountains together.
Dr. Simon Priest is a Canadian from Burnaby, British Columbia (near Vancouver). His areas of expertise include corporate training and development, wilderness resource management, and adventure travel and ecotourism. In addition to being a dean, provost, vice chancellor, senior vice president, president, and commissioner, he has held full professorships in business management, online education, and recreation and leisure. He has received more than 15 awards for his teaching and research, including the Willi Unsoeld Award from the Association for Experiential Education, and he has been invited as a visiting scholar at about 30 international institutions.
Dr. Michael Gass is an American from Durham, New Hampshire (near Boston). His areas of expertise include adventure therapy, wilderness orientation programs, and program accreditation. He is the director of the Outdoor Behavioral Healthcare Research Center (OBHRC) as well as the National Association for Therapeutic Schools and Programs (NATSAP) research database. He is a full professor at the University of New Hampshire as well as a licensed marriage and family therapist. He currently leads and directs several critical research initiatives in the field of behavioral health care. He has received more than 20 awards, including the Kurt Hahn Award, Distinguished Researcher Award, and Outstanding Teacher Award from the Association for Experiential Education. He has been invited as a visiting scholar at about 20 international institutions.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Qualitative Modifications
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
Are you overwhelmed with the amount of numbers in the weighting and choosing phases? In this next example, we have used a qualitative method of weighting that is easier for leaders who are not mathematically inclined or are unable to juggle and balance several numbers in their heads.
You can't break every decision down into quantifiable probabilities. In fact, you will be able to deal with the majority of decisions by effectively considering the qualities of the information you gather for any option. Picture yourself as a bicycle trip leader with a choice of six different routes to take between campsites as mapped in figure 14.4. Driving to the next campsite or staying put are two other options available to you. The problem facing you is how to best balance existing risks with biking pleasure.
Figure 14.4 Representative map of the six bike routes.
By interpreting the map and using judgment, you should gather the facts and assumptions about the six routes. Route 1 (shortest distance) is a straight line along a major divided highway with a very high volume of traffic, no shoulder, and gentle grades. Route 2 (longest distance) follows and crosses a creek on a scenic winding route on hard-packed paths along old railway grades. Route 3 (moderate distance) has light traffic on a hilly, gravel back road, part of which follows a flat railway cut with a section of road missing, and your judgment guesses that walking the bikes along the side of the tracks might be possible. Route 4 (short) follows minor highways with heavy traffic and parallels the major highway and cuts underneath it at one point. Route 5 (long) duplicates route 3 except that it crosses the railway instead of following it and climbs over a steep mountain pass with nice views on dirt back roads. Route 6 (moderate) rambles along paved farm roads with moderate traffic, crossing the same scenic creek as route 2 but by a less direct route of straight segments and right-angled turns. Remember, you also could just drive to the next campsite or hang around the same campsite all day.
Because you are seeking a balance of risk management and enjoyment, during weeding out, you should probably drop the two options of driving to the campsite or staying put for the day. Certainly, driving or hanging around doesn't let anyone enjoy bicycling. Once you have weeded out the superfluous options, the six routes remain. This is a large number to subject to the next step, but you could reduce it by applying additional criteria, such as avoiding vehicle fumes or hills and seeking paved surfaces or scenery.
Organizing the six remaining routes into a qualitative comparison table, as done in figure 14.5, replaces the quantitative decision tree. This is a simple way to compare the pros and cons of the available options. For the six options, we list qualities worth considering in order of importance and then show sample responses.
Figure 14.5 Comparative tabulated summary of the six bike routes.
Qualities are typically organized around the three themes of positive, such as alternatives, benefits, contingencies, and points of interest; neutral, such as costs, distances, terrain, road type, and surface; and negative, such as traffic and other dangers, concerns, and possible consequences. You don't have to include all themes in such a comparative table, but to be the most effective, you should consider all the available information and evaluation criteria. For example, alternatives and contingencies are often overlooked variables to any consequences that might result if you select an option and put it into action. You should take into account any contingency plan that might make an option more desirable and prepare an alternative plan in case the option you select falls short of expectations.
When following a qualitative approach to weighting the content of these tables, you may prefer to avoid numerical quantities. While the mathematical leader might correctly state that negatives are half the concern, positives a third, and neutrals the remaining sixth (or a similar weighting), this approach is not qualitative. Instead, you may mentally cross out the entries that are equivalent options, recognizing that entries higher on the list carry more weight in the decision. It requires sound judgment to estimate or predict equivalence.
For example, you can view entire options and entries between options or within the same option as "six of one and half a dozen of another." Exposure to extreme traffic for the shortest distance without a shoulder on route 1 may be equivalent to a short distance of exposure to heavy traffic with an underpass to negotiate on route 4. In another light, the bridge crossings on routes 2 and 4 may equal the railway walk on route 3. For route 5, the extra energy expended for the hill climb may be worth the nice views.
For the purpose of choosing, identifying equal entries removes many of the more moderate qualities. Those few extremes that remain may allow the best option to stand out. Thus, once you have accounted for equivalencies using judgment, the reduced entries permit you to more effectively choose the option that has the strongest chance of success.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Frontloading
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience.
Frontloading involves asking questions before the activity or learning experience that allow clients to change their behaviors in the experience. "Front" indicates that the facilitation takes place up front, or before the experience. "Loading" refers to the fact that the learning is loaded together, or emphasized, in combination beforehand. In summary, frontloading means punctuating the key learning points in advance of the adventure experience rather than reviewing or debriefing learning after. Frontloading typically utilizes one or more of the following six types of questions: revisiting, objectives, motivation, function, dysfunction, and prediction as shown in figure 13.3.
Figure 13.3 The frontloading bullhorn: single questions asked before the learning experience.
The excitement of adventure activities can help a group focus intensely on completing a task, distracting it from the changes it is there to accomplish. The revisiting question reminds group members of the behaviors they pledged to perform after the last activity. Just before the new activity begins and after you have explained the task, you can pose a single question: "One more thing. What were the commitments the group made last time?" This brief question brings the previous answers to the "do things differently next time" question to the front of clients' minds so they are more likely to act on their revisited affirmations during the activity.
Besides a revisiting question, you can ask other types of frontloading questions in combination or alone. Objective questions ask about the aims of the activity and what can be learned or gained from the experience. Motivation questions ask why experiencing the activity may be important and how learning relates to daily life. Function questions ask what behaviors will help bring about success and how the group may optimize them. Dysfunction questions ask what behaviors will hinder success and how the group can avoid or overcome them. Prediction questions ask clients to imagine what is going to happen. These six question types for frontloading are like the six question types used as filters in the funneling model. In fact, look again at figures 13.2 and 13.3; turn one upside down and you have the other. The difference between frontloading and funneling questions is timing: when you ask the questions. Frontloading questions come before and funneling questions come after the experience.
The six question types can be illustrated with the wall activity. This activity includes a 12- to 14-foot (three- to four-meter) structure with a ledge on the back side. The group is challenged to pass its members up the front side and over the top. One difficult aspect of getting over the wall is getting the first person up. Generally, the crux of the problem is getting the last person over the wall with no one remaining below to lift him or her. In a typical briefing before the activity, you introduce the problem by mentioning the group goal of getting everyone over the wall; task constraints, such as not holding onto the edges or not using props other than the available resources; safety rules, including no more than two people on the ledge at a time and no holding people upside down; safety procedures, such as removing jewelry and always spotting; and the time limit, such as 30 minutes, including planning. Many programs then give clients the right to pass and be challenged by choice; some programs employ helmets and harnesses to prevent head injury or torn clothing; and a few programs include handicaps, such as blindfolds or muting. During the briefing, you could add one or more of the frontloading questions outlined in table 13.3.
Frontloading can take place either before or after the logistical briefing. You may even occasionally include frontloading within that briefing. However, we caution you about too much frontloading. The average person can juggle five to nine thoughts at once (Miller, 1956). A typical adventure activity briefing has a half dozen or so important points clients must retain for safety and accuracy. Adding more than two or three extra points by frontloading can overload clients, possibly causing them to forget the key points they need. Most importantly, overusing frontloading can create a dependency on the facilitator; clients learn to rely on you to do the thinking for them. Even so, when used in moderation, say for 10 percent of the activities, frontloading can be an effective facilitation tool.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Setting Goals and Objectives
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients.
Goals and objectives form the foundation for all lessons taught in adventure programs. Setting goals and objectives is critical to outdoor leaders and almost as important to clients. You should use goals and objectives to define the direction of the adventure program and prepare and organize adventure experiences. Clients should use them to plan for after the adventure program as they continue dealing with daily life. In all cases, writing detailed goals and objectives can augment the reasoning processes for both you and your clients.
Goals are general intents that stem from the adventure program's purpose. Objectives are specific target declarations that clarify and expand each goal. If, for example, the purpose of a program is to reduce juvenile delinquency in a community, then one goal might be to reduce self-destructive behaviors in at-risk youth who are clients. Furthermore, one of several objectives for this goal might be to improve the self-concept of youth clients as measured by their scores on the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale or other assessment tools through adventure activities conducted over three months. Although you and your clients should write down goals and objectives, consider them to always be in flux and never carved in stone. Note that a program could also use goals and objectives to direct leaders' or clients' behaviors or performances.
We can divide goals into four different kinds: regular work goals, problem-solving goals, innovative goals, and developmental goals. Let's examine these four types for an adventure program working with female survivors of sexual abuse. Note that we have written these goals with the behavior in mind that you should target.
- Regular work goals are those that make up the major portion of your responsibilities to ensure the safe, effective, and efficient delivery of program services. Example: Empower clients by giving them greater control over the experience.
- Problem-solving goals give you opportunities to solve major problems and prevent program quality from suffering by solving them. Example: Intervene in potential flashback situations that may limit client benefits.
- Innovative goals proactively improve the delivery of program services. Example: Anticipate and eliminate barriers to transfer of learning when clients return to society.
- Developmental goals are intended to improve your performance so that a program can improve services, adjust to changing market conditions, deliver better-quality services, and reinvest in staff. Example: Educate staff on upcoming minor alterations in the boundaries associated with physical contact with clients.
Objectives are extremely detailed, and several objectives may constitute a general goal. In other words, one goal may have multiple objectives. With corporate clients, a normal goal is to develop teamwork. Four resulting objectives for this singular goal could be related to trust, support, cooperation, and communication. For example, on completion of the adventure program, the client will have demonstrated the following:
- Trust in group members by completing the Trust Fall into others' arms from a tabletop
- A willingness to accept and offer help as evidenced by sharing at least five ideas during a complex group task without receiving discouraging comments from any group members
- An ability to work with others without argument under adversity or time deadlines
- Effective listening skills by speaking one at a time during all debriefing sessions and not making comments unrelated to the discussion
Note that we have written these objectives with the client's targeted behavior in mind. All four of these interdependent objectives identify elements of conduct, conditions, or criteria (Mager, 1984). Conduct denotes what you expect a client to do, generally using active verbs to portray either a process or a product of performance. Conditions describe the circumstances under which performance takes place. Criteria indicate acceptable performance, generally using some measure of evaluation to determine success. Objectives ideally include all three of these elements. For example, after finishing the module on kayak strokes, the novice client will be able to paddle forward and backward and skull laterally through an English gate one meter/yard wide on flatwater (conduct), with no wind (conditions), and without touching the gate with the paddle or craft (criteria).
Another way of writing objectives is to make them SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.
- Specific: You should precisely state the expected outcome. If you want to be richer, specifically how much money do you need to obtain to easily meet your needs?
- Measurable: Define the change as an outcome to reach. If you don't know where you are going, how will you know when you get there?
- Achievable: Change should be possible. Setting unachievable objectives merely leads to frustration. Do you have the resources necessary for achieving this objective?
- Realistic: You should base the change in actual circumstances. Is change real or valuable if it takes place during imaginary role-playing?
- Time bound: You should expect the change to be accomplished by a certain deadline. If you have no time limit for completion, will you have the incentive to finish?
Last, adventure programs are typically evaluated based on goals and objectives. For goal and objective setting to be of any value, the goals and objectives you set must be relevant, concise, and meaningful. The more accurate and appropriate the goals and objectives set, the greater the true reflection of learning achieved.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.
Ethical Standards
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances.
Indeed, ethical standards have limitations. Ethical guidelines may conflict within certain cultures, requiring you to adapt them in such instances. Or you may find yourself in a situation in which a conflict exists among legal, organizational, and ethical guidelines. Conflict between ethical guidelines and their interpretation will likely arise and lead to dilemmas for you to resolve. No matter what your course of action, the summum bonum (do no harm) ethic you as a professional follow should be guided by empathy for the client. With this in mind, let's look closely at these guidelines.
- Professionals conduct experiences with competence. As an outdoor leader, promote and conduct activities within your level. Provide services within the boundaries of your education, training, supervision, experience, and practice. Take reasonable steps to ensure the competence of your work. Avoid situations in which personal problems or conflicts will impair your performance or judgment. Stay abreast of current information in the field. Participate in ongoing professional efforts to maintain your knowledge, practice, and skills.
- Professionals conduct experiences with integrity. Conduct activities with honesty, fairness, and respect toward both clients and peers. Avoid false, misleading, or deceptive statements when describing or reporting qualifications, services, products, or fees. Be aware of how your personal belief system, values, needs, and limitations affect clients.
- Professionals conduct experiences with responsibility. Uphold the ethical principles of your work. Be clear with clients as to what everyone's roles and obligations are. Accept responsibility for your behavior and decisions. Adapt methods to the needs of different populations. Ensure that you possess an adequate basis for professional judgments. Do not offer services when the constraints of limited contact will not benefit client needs (e.g., promising a single-day adventure experience will resolve a deep issue for a therapeutic or corporate population). Continue services only if it is reasonably clear that clients will benefit. Conduct experiences in a manner that minimally impacts or only temporarily damages the environment.
- Professionals conduct experiences with respect for the rights and dignity of clients. Respect the fundamental rights, dignity, and worth of all people. Respect clients' rights to privacy, confidentiality, and self-determination within the limits of the law. Be sensitive to cultural and individual differences, including those due to age, gender, race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, disability, and socioeconomic status. Do not engage in sexual or other harassment or exploitation of clients. Respect clients' rights to make decisions as well as help clients understand the consequences of their choices. Inform clients about the services and their rights, risks, and responsibilities. Offer an opportunity to discuss the results, interpretations, and conclusions of the adventure experience with clients. Respect clients' rights to refuse consent to services and activities. Obtain informed consent from clients and, when appropriate, their parents or guardians before beginning services. Accurately represent your competence, training, education, and experience relevant to the program you are delivering.
- Professionals conduct experiences with concern for the well-being of clients. Be sensitive to clients' needs and well-being. Provide for the physical needs of clients, including necessary water, nutrition, clothing, shelter, rest, or other essentials. Monitor the use of emotional and physical risk in adventure experiences. Assist in obtaining other services if the program cannot for appropriate reasons provide the professional help clients may need. Plan experiences with the clients' best interests in mind both during and after the program. Respect clients' rights to decide which confidential material can be made public, except under extreme conditions as required by law to prevent a clear and immediate danger to a person or persons.
- Professionals conduct experiences with recognition for their social responsibility. Be aware of your responsibilities to community and society. Encourage the development of standards and policies that serve your clients' interests as well as those of the public. Respect the property of others.
- Professionals conduct experiences with objectivity by avoiding dual relationships with clients that impair professional judgment. Do not exploit or mislead clients or other leaders during and after professional relationships. Relationships include, but are not limited to, business, close personal, family, sexual, and otherwise inappropriate physical.
- Professionals conduct experiences to serve others. Assist people in need by addressing client social issues. Serve clients in ways so they become servant leaders themselves in their own culture and society. Understand the potential conflicts of ethical differences through service.
- Professionals conduct experiences with social justice in mind. Challenge social injustices, particularly for those clients who are subject to society's greatest levels of unjust actions and perspectives. Support clients who find themselves in extremely vulnerable and powerless situations. Advocate for and strongly support those individuals and groups of people who are at a disadvantage from prejudice, poverty, discrimination, and other forms of social injustice. Make active efforts to address social injustice at all levels, using the tools of awareness, comprehensive knowledge, dialogue, action, advocacy, and decision making to rectify its unjust social imbalances.
- Professionals conduct experiences with the dignity and worth of the person in mind. Respect the personal rights of everyone. Match the context of cultural and ethnic diversity, empower clients to create their own destiny and pathway to achieve their own goals, and respect and empower the personal rights of everyone.
Learn more about Effective Leadership in Adventure Programming, Third Edition, With Field Handbook.