This week, I thought I'd talk about something that happened last week on a hike I was leading. It was in the Royal National Park. For those of you who don't know it, it's an amazing national park just south of Sydney, featuring rugged sandstone cliffs, secluded beaches and home to the famous figure 8 pools and the infamous wedding cake. Our hike was with 27 kids heading North from Otford on the amazing coastal track. It was a hot afternoon and the 10km took us approximately 3 hours to cover. The cool coastal breeze hitting us as we reached the summit of the headland between North Era and Garie Beach was a welcome relief. Garie Beach, NSW In at Garie beach, we'd just unpacked the trailer when I was approached by a girl in her late teens. She said to me "Hi. Sorry, ummm... I've got three questions", "Sure what's up?" I replied. "Where's the coastal track continue?" she asked "Just at the end of the beach here." "Ok... Question 2, does anyone know first aid?" "Sure! What's up?" "My friend's rolled her ankle. Could you take a look?" "Sure no worries. I can take a look." I had a look and she had a sprained ankle, so I strapped it and so that was question 2 sorted! Then for question 3! "Where's the nearest public transport?" Oh dear... I thought... I asked a few questions about where they'd come from and what their plans were. They'd come from Sydney via Bundeena and walked about 22km of the track, aiming to cover the whole 32km in a single day. An ambitious goal for the fittest of hikers. They were obviously tired, injured, no head torches, low on food and completely out of water... So my risk management brain started to go into overdrive, trying to do the sums of how many hours the rest of the trip would take under normal conditions, then estimating the addtional time with an injury, then add in no torches. It was late afternoon and no chance of water resupply along the way. This was not a pretty picture! I quickly ran through a few scenarios in my head and didn't like any of them that involved the girls continuing, so after a quick chat with the other instructors, we put the offer to the girls to transport them to Waterfall station, which wasn't too far away! To everyone's relief they accepted our offer and we dropped them off at the station. So the question becomes what to do when you come across others in a similar situation? You've still got to consider your group as the number 1 priority. If they're all ok and supervised, then I think there's a moral obligation to help, especially if you perceive that the third party could be at risk of harm if they were to continue on. After all, the experience you have as an educator and leader can mean that you see things which others don't. It can be a complicated problem, which must be considered each time you run into someone and the circumstances surrounding your meeting them (and yes this group wasn't the first I've come across, but more about that later). At the end of the day, protect your group, but also give freely of your skills and experience to prevent harm coming to those who might not have been as well prepared as you. Part Of The Amazing Coast Track
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Ergh! I hear you cry! To be honest I feel the same way about most excursions and the food that's served. It's crap and all the staff try and sneak off for coffee or brunch at any fleeting opportunity. I've had a lot of camp food over the years and it's varied from 'I think they're trying to poison us' to 'that's really awesome!' So why is it so inconsistent between venues? Is it because it's hard to cook for so many people? Well... In a word... No! It's actually not! A lot of the time it comes down to total laziness on the part of the caterers. Once the kitchen has a look at dietary needs, that's it! They simply concoct the most average bollocks they can imagine and slop out to everyone. Since you're only there for a few days nobody seems to notice (or care)! But does this make it okay for them to do a rubbish job? Absolutely not!!! If a venue and program want to have a great reputation for quality, they need to put just as much effort into their food as they do the safety and management of the activities they run the two shouldn't be seen as mutually exclusive. If you serve crap and kids aren't eating, this just adds to the activity risk, so don't do it! I've owned my own café and been a cook for a residential snow sports training camp in the US, so I know from experience that it's not that hard to cater for large groups with decent food. It just takes a bit of thought and effort! Cooks need to stop using the excuse that some people don't like spice for making food taste like crap. Too many of them try to race to the bottom to cater for the minority and end up producing nothing but rubbish. This results in food being neither delicious, nor nutritious. However, my experience hasn't been all bad and I can think of three programs I've worked on, where the quality of the food was awesome! Every meal was simple, flavoursome and there was plenty of it. So what's your point? Well, my point is don't accept mediocrity when it comes to what's served! Leading up to your excursion, as part of your planning, talk to the catering staff and see what they're going to provide. Make changes if it isn't suitable and provide some honest feedback for what's served. Failing that, leave someone else in charge of the kids and join the rest of the staff at the local Thai restaurant.
Happy eating! Thinking back, can you remember the first time you had to deal with a real first aid emergency?
My first experience is something that's always stuck in my mind, as it was confronting and my reaction wasn't what it would be now. We were out on a night navigation exercise, ascending a spur under head torch light, when one of the students collapsed. As soon as I saw him go down, everything I learnt on my two day first aid course went out the window... I completely froze... This left me feeling overwhelmed and helpless! I wasn't sure what I should be doing. I had this sudden debilitating feeling... I can't deal with this! Thankfully I had another really experienced teacher with me, who jumped in and took charge of the situation. The day had been ragingly hot and it turned out the boy was severely dehydrated and suffering from heat stroke. It's hard to train for this sort of situation and until it actually happens, it's very hard to know what your initial reaction is going be and what it's going to feel like. It's even harder to know what to do about it. However, one important thing you can do in any situation, in the words of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, is 'Don't Panic'. Take a deep breath, be calm, collected and assess the situation. Run through the DRSABCD calmly in your head and look around assessing the area as you approach. This will give you time to put your gloves on, collect your thoughts and balance out the adrenaline that your brain has just shot into your body. Don't let your body overwhelm you in this sort of situation. Calmness and common sense helps a great deal and first aid is not a solo effort, so if you can, call another teacher in to help manage the situation and provide support for the casualty whilst you wait for emergency services. Remember, most importantly, you're there stabilising and protecting your students from further harm until the ambulance arrives. After that incident I decided I should upgrade my training beyond the basic two day course and so I studied wilderness first aid. This helped develop my confidence in treating injuries and managing casualties, but still nothing focussed and developed my skills more than the experience of a student walking up to me dripping with blood from massive cuts to his chest, hands and stomach! But that's a story for another time! What comes to mind when you think about excursions you went on as a kid? Was it the excitement of going away? Did you get to try cool new activities? Was it just fun not being at school?
Since this blog is about excursions, it should come as no surprise that getting away from the classroom formed the most exciting times I had at school. But of course my memories vary from awesome adventures, to downright boring! I’ll give you an example of each! Ok boring one first to get it out of the way! Canberra! Sorry year 6 teachers around the country, but it was a seriously boring trip! We even didn’t stop to pickup fireworks in Fischwick… So yeah… Anyway, before I get too critical, Canberra is an important trip and is something, I’m going to revisit later in the year! So now for the best trip! Maths Camp! Seriously??? Maths Camp??? Hey, before you mash that keyboard and fill my inbox with complains about our national capital… Hear me out!! Ok so maths camp was a wild ride of excitement. I was fourteen at the time, and to begin with it was lame, I mean really lame! The camp was at Lake Keepit Sport and Rec, near Tamworth. As the name suggests, there’s lots of sport and recreational activities to be had there, like archery, canoeing, grass skiing, rock climbing and sailing! Yet the maths teachers hadn’t correlated this until part way through the first day of gruelling maths sessions! Anyway, I won’t delve into that Freudian mess! They decided at the last minute.., wait… how about we do maths sessions, mixed with outdoor activities! Wow Snap! I think you’re onto something there Mr. Kepler! And so this was my first experience of trigonometry followed by sailing! In the end, what made this camp so good, was simply variety and a great balance of activities. I loved the maths sessions because they were all problem solving, which was then followed by some new and exciting outside! I have to confess though, on the same camp, I did manage to get locked out of my room several times, banned for life from a game of dungeons and dragons, mistook a girl for a boy and got handcuffed to a flag pole! At the time you don’t realise how much effort those teachers put in to making this such a success, but for me, the mix and variety of challenges turned what could’ve been a very forgettable camp into an amazing and memorable experience! |
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