Education

"Experience in itself is neither productive nor unproductive, it is how you reflect on it that makes it significant or not significant for good or ill ..." (Bolton, 1979)

Adventure education is a powerful medium in which to work. With power comes responsibility. It is precisely because the medium of adventure can be so powerful that adventure educators have a responsibility to find out what kind of impact adventurous experiences are having. And as educators, it makes sense to assist and assess the learning experiences which are aroused by adventure. Through reviewing, facilitators demonstrate that they care about what participants experience, value what participants have to say, and are interested in the progress of each individual's learning and development (Greenaway, 1992).

Reviewing energises the process of learning from experience. Some of the reviewing methods that are possible after an adventure fit the dictionary definition of 'review': "to see, view or examine again: to look back on or over: to survey: to examine critically: to revise..." (Chambers's Dictionary). But this definition does not convey the full range of methods that can be used to enhance learning and development after an adventure. 'Review' is a word that can sound cold, clinical and critical, as if it will produce a sudden (and solemn) change of climate following an intense or lively experience. But the alternative terms for reviewing ('debriefing', 'processing' and 'reflection') are really no better at suggesting that a review can be as lively and involving as the adventure that precedes it.

Reviewing may be justifiable as being a rewarding experience in itself. But how essential is it to the process of learning from experience? Is it always necessary to review an experience to learn from it?

• Are there not plenty of adventurous experiences which are rewarding in themselves, and in which the learning is self-evident?
• Is not the outdoor environment valued because it allows people to learn directly from the consequences of their actions?
• Surely adventures can be meaningful enough without needing to make sense of them through reviews?
• When learning has already been an integral part of the experience, should reviewing not be seen as an optional feature?

These are important questions to ask, because the experiences at the heart of adventure-based learning can be substantially different in character to the kinds of experiences which feed other forms of experiential learning. The importance of reviewing does seem to depend on the nature of the experience, but to conclude that 'big' experiences need less reviewing, seems insensitive and irresponsible.

It is when activity and review are working well together that the real adventure takes off - the adventure of personal and social development. It is an adventure which includes three interdependent elements:

The challenge is to discover ways of merging these three elements rather than attempting to depend on any one model or sequence as a guide for practice. In the short term, a single element may dominate the experience, but ultimately this dynamic form of education depends on the harnessing and intermixing of these three sources of adventure: the activity adventure, the group adventure and the learning adventure.  (NAOE: 2005)

How then, should the nature of the experience affect the nature of reviewing?

Is experiential learning theory (such as that of Kolb, 1984) really so versatile that it can be usefully applied to any experience - from boiling an egg to climbing a mountain?

• new and challenging activities
• new group experiences and
• new ways of learning