Let’s compare the pair – Australia and Singapore.
- Singapore is geographically the smallest in the world; only spanning a minimal 42 km long and 23 km wide within a within a compact 716.1 km² (Martin & Ho, 2009). Australia is the world’s sixth largest country spanning a gigantic 7,692,024 km² and stretching a whopping 3860 kilometres from its most northerly point of Cape York to its most southerly point in Tasmania. and almost 4000 kilometres from it’s most western point Steep Point to it’s most eastern point of Cape Byron (Australian Travel Search, 1999).
- Singapore despite it’s size possesses a mammoth populous of approximately 5.3 million residents (Singapore Statistics, 2015). Australian on the other hand has a population of 23.8 million (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2015).
Pretty different right? I thought so as well. These are the easy facts to differentiate. I could have imagined this without making the 6,060 km journey. The more difficult distinctions that I intend to focus on required me to dive into the programs and outdoor education system whilst moving about Singapore, and speaking with various outdoor education staff at institutes like Outward Bound (OBS), Republic Polytechnic and people along my travels. From conversations and observation I got the emphasis that although both Australia both agree to the multitude of benefits that outdoor education can encompass, that the order of importance was slightly contrasting. In Australia, we tend to concentrate on the role outdoor adventure activities can play in shaping connectedness to nature within outdoor education as one of the top priority learning outcomes (Martin, 2004). As where, I found through discussions, the significance of this in Singapore, was still prevalent, however behind the front running outcomes of developing personal attributes like resilience, responsibility and leadership behaviours. This point is furthered by Martin & Ho (2009) whom speak about a survey conducted by the Singaporean Ministry Of Education (MOE) at the Outdoor Education Conference in 2006. The survey was undertaken by conference participants whom were all teachers and/or outdoor instructors. Participants were asked to ‘indicate what they considered to be important learning outcomes developed through outdoor education in Singapore’ with a total of fifteen outcomes included in the survey. The results of the survey as shown.
Table 1 is a clear demonstration of the importance of personal development within outdoor education in Singapore as the top 8 learning outcomes relate directly to personal development. This gives depth to my opinion of the differences between Singapore and Australian learning outcomes.
And yet, I wonder why this may be?
Martin & Ho (2009) speak about ‘outdoor education not being a universal value, rather, outdoor education’s contributions need to be grounded in time, place and culture’. I believe this to be correct, and also that the differences stem from where Australia and Singapore place themselves respectively on the perspectives of nature model (Gough, 1990). I cannot support this claim directly, however can assume that Singapore may sit slightly more towards seeing nature as an object then a subject, due to their rankings of learning outcomes when compared to Australia.
Finally, I conclude with despite these differences, nothing determines that we are correct and they are incorrect in the order of learning outcomes. I am simple pointing out the differences that I have observed and felt separated outdoor education in Australia and Singapore.
References
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2015). Population Clock. Retrieved 8th of August, from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Web+Pages/Population+Clock?opendocument
Australian Travel Search. (1999). Australian Facts & Figures. Retrieved 8th of August, from http://www.australiatravelsearch.com.au/trc/facts.html
Gough, N. (1990) Imagining Our Relationships with Nature. Connections: A Conference for the Environment. the Outdoor and Camping. Bendigo: Unpublished paper.
Martin & Ho. (2009) Seeking resilience and sustainability: outdoor education in Singapore, Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 9:1, 79-92, DOI: 10.1080/1472967080267016
Martin, P. (2004). Outdoor adventure in promoting relationships with nature. Australian Journal of Outdoor Education, 8(1), 20-28.
Martin, P. (1996). New perspectives of self, nature and others. Australian Journal of Outdoor Education, 1(3), 3-9
Singapore Statistics. (2015). Population and Population Structure. Retrieved 8th of August, from http://www.singstat.gov.sg/statistics/browse-by-theme/population-and-population-structure