Outdoor Learning

Guto Bebb Excerpts

Wednesday 15th December 2010 Westminster Hall

[Mr Williams]

Absolutely. One of the benefits of the project that I was involved in was that we considered the seasonality of fruit and vegetables. I think that it is assumed that because children live in a rural area they have automatic access to farms and to schemes of the kind that the NFU and others, such as the Farmers Union of Wales, have put forward. That assumption should not be made. That is why the debate is important, for getting some clear guidelines. It is beginning to seem a little like a Welsh debate—I am proud of that, but I shall not stray on to devolved matters.

Every year at the school where I taught we took the year 5 and 6 children to stay at an outdoor pursuit centre in Montgomeryshire, where they could do kayaking, orienteering, rock climbing, mountain walks and canoeing—the very kinds of activities from which many children with special needs, who were not high achievers in the classroom, really gained. We were teaching concepts of teamwork, collaborative work and team building. Those were important opportunities for the children.

[Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)]

The point that my hon. Friend makes about the outdoor pursuit centre is important. My hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) made the point that health and safety is an issue when taking children out of the classroom, and such outdoor pursuit centres have health and safety covered; they have the skills to deal with pupils safely and give them the experiences that have been described.

[Mr Williams]

I agree very much. One of the nice things for a teacher organising such trips was that there was no need to get embroiled in the bureaucracy of organising a risk assessment; it had already been done by trained professionals.

This is a core debate, not a peripheral thing. It is not a trendy lefty debate about the effectiveness of group work or topic work—debates that have happened in the past. It is about enhancing learning in the classroom, teaching in context, teaching in the real world and broadening horizons in the strongest way. As I reflect on my education, I recall that the only such opportunity that I had in secondary school—there was little in primary school—was the Duke of Edinburgh’s award scheme. That is a great scheme, with great opportunities for young people, but very much curtailed and limited.

Was there, in the three schools where I taught, always a dedicated member of staff with expertise, responsible for developing the outdoor curriculum? If there was, in some instances it was not very visible. Should we give more prominence to outdoor education in initial teacher training? I did a PGCE course, from which I benefited; I gained my qualification and enjoyed my 12 years in the classroom, but there were limitations with respect to outdoor education.

To repeat a question that has been put to the Minister, is the initial teacher training that we provide giving teachers the skills that they need to lead outdoor learning? It is all very well talking about identifying opportunities; teachers sit there developing their lesson plans and identifying opportunities. It is a matter of whether those opportunities for outdoor learning can be delivered. It is not about burdening the curriculum. I agree with the direction of travel: it is about scaling down the curriculum.

Years ago, I worked as a researcher in the other place. When the national curriculum was introduced in 1988, I remember the huge number of representations from different organisations in favour of including subjects in the national curriculum. That was an over-burdening experience.

I also remember, years later when I was in the classroom, the minutiae of detail directed from the centre about how I should deliver a numeracy hour and a literacy hour, down to the five minutes of a plenary session at the end. We are moving away from that over-prescriptive period. There is consensus among all who have spoken so far that we are seeking to build meaningful cross-curricular links in key areas of the curriculum—notably geography, history and science—for which outdoor activities are appropriate.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire mentioned, the Select Committee on Children, Schools and Families produced its report in April 2010. I want to draw on three of its conclusions. First, the report talked of the ability of families to pay, or their inability to pay, for trips and the deterrent to schools in offering opportunities to pupils. At one school where I taught, there was a blanket policy. We could not countenance any outlandish trips, because we knew that the parents in the deprived wards of that area would be unable even to subsidise their children’s trips.

The Select Committee recognised the principle of subsidies for children from low-income families for school trips, and I think that that should be endorsed. The report also talked about an individual entitlement within the national curriculum to at least one school visit each term. That is integral to the curriculum that needs to be delivered. I would like to hear the Minister’s comments on that individual entitlement to outdoor education.

--- Later in debate ---

[Guto Bebb (Aberconwy) (Con)]

I will be brief to ensure that every hon. Member who wants to contribute can do so. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire (Simon Hart) on bringing this excellent and positive debate to the House.

My hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Alun Cairns) declared an interest because he has one child going through the school foundation stage in Wales. I have twin boys and another three children going through the educational system in Wales, so I, too, need to declare an interest. When we talk about the educational benefits of outdoor activities, we in Wales are very fortunate. I do not want to dominate the debate by referring to Wales again, but as a child I used to go to the Urdd Gobaith Cymru centre in Llangrannog in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Ceredigion (Mr Williams). When I was slightly older, I went to the centre at Glan Llyn, where I learned canoeing and white-water rafting. The terrible thing is that I am now old enough to see my children getting the same experiences.

The concept of getting children into the outdoors and enjoying pursuits is important and I fully subscribe to the comments made by several hon. Members.

I wish to focus on a slightly different aspect of the importance of outdoor activities to the educational sector—its economic impact on constituencies such as mine. My constituency of Aberconwy includes a large tract of Snowdonia. The area has had to struggle to create employment and economic opportunities, and we have had to make the best of the facilities and the environment that we have. Agriculture is obviously important, as is food production and our specialist food producers, but a growing part of the economy in my part of the world has been the outdoor activity sector.

That sector is not entirely dependent on educational customers, but they allow companies to offer an all-year service, with year-round employment for young people from my constituency. I could give numerous examples— they will challenge Hansard—of organisations and companies in my part of the world that benefit from providing services to schools in all parts of the United Kingdom.

For instance, Plas y Brenin at Capel Curig is renowned as a mountaineering centre. We have an outdoor education centre at Conwy, which brings young people to the Conwy valley to enjoy white-water rafting and so forth. Tree Top Adventure offers excellent facilities at Betws-y-Coed, but it depends on school trips to allow it to offer employment every day of the week and all year round; it makes an important contribution to the economy of my constituency.

We also have specialist companies that deal with the health and safety aspects. They offer a safe environment for young people to experience the adventure and the challenges offered by the environment in areas such as mine. Snowdonia is not there only for the enjoyment of people who can afford to pay for an expensive hotel or a slightly cheaper bed and breakfast for a weekend visit. The environment of Snowdonia should be enjoyed by young people.

In addition to private sector companies offering services in my constituency and throughout Snowdonia, we have a number of other centres, including the Oaklands Centre at Capel Garmon. Oaklands is owned by Wirral borough council. It is about an hour and a half down the road from the Wirral to my constituency. Young people are brought from an industrialised area and taken to the beauty of Snowdonia where they can enjoy the challenge of getting involved in outdoor activities. The contribution made by the Oaklands centre is also economic. For instance, it employs local people to ensure that there is food on the table when the young people arrive.

Throughout Snowdonia, numerous centres are in danger of being lost because of the priorities of local authorities, which may not emphasise the importance of their contribution to the educational sector. I am therefore concerned about the future of centres such as Oaklands. They are important not only because of the opportunities that they give the young people who visit them, but because they give people in my constituency the opportunity to stay and work in a rural area, often in highly skilled positions. It needs to be said that the opportunities afforded by the outdoor activity centres in my part of the world are extremely important because of the quality of the jobs that are created. Taking responsibility for groups of young people going mountaineering or out on rivers is a highly skilled position.

I applaud the local authorities in my part of the world. We hear a lot about the need for local authorities to work across boundaries. In north-west Wales, Isle of Anglesey county council, Gwynedd county council and Conwy county borough council have come together to form the North Wales Outdoor Partnership. It was developed to give young people from that part of the world an understanding of not only the enjoyment that can be had from the environment of Snowdonia, but the economic opportunities that exist. The partnership takes young people out to enjoy mountaineering, kayaking and so on, but it also highlights the economic opportunities that can develop from becoming skilled in such activities. Numerous young people have found employment as a result of the skills gained through the partnership.

Menter Iaith Conwy, a local company, has highlighted the need to train young people to be responsible for taking people out on to the mountains. The fantastic thing is that the company is training people through the medium of Welsh or English. Again, it highlights the fact that economic opportunities are available through outdoor education.

Government spending is not necessarily the way forward for every part of the economy; those organisations and companies could develop employment opportunities in the private sector. However, the educational market is important in ensuring proper employment all year round. When such decisions are made, it is important that we take account of the economic impact of those activities on the rural economy.