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Do Teachers Have To Go On School Trips?

You might not get paid to go, but there are benefits to volunteering to staff your school’s next residential

Kim Somerville
by Kim Somerville

Residentials are often the most memorable experience of children’s’ school days; for staff, they are extremely rewarding, if exhausting.

Learning Away, a campaigning group led by the Council for Learning Outside the Classroom, has undertaken compelling research, spanning five years and 60 schools, and has discovered that the impact of a residential is even greater when schools follow a set of guiding principles which can transform trips into highly effective ‘brilliant residentials’.

These principles include residentials being led by teachers, co-designed with students, fully integrated into the curriculum and affordable for all.

If schools follow these principles, teachers have acknowledged they can improve pupils’ resilience, achievement, relationships and engagement with learning, often playing a ‘transformational role’ in re-engaging some of the most disadvantaged pupils with their studies. It’s easy to see the benefits for your students, but what is in it for you? You may be thinking that dealing with travel sickness, sleepwalking or leaking toothpaste is not the career high you are looking for, but residentials have been proven to play a transformational role for the staff involved too.

Here are five reasons to say ‘yes’ to taking part in a residential.

1. Learn to experiment

Residentials give you time to reflect on your practice and your teaching, to become more experimental and flexible. In the Learning Away programme, teachers were more willing and confident to take risks and try new methods.

They were also more trusting of their students and linked this to the improved relationships developed on residentials.

A member of the staff focus group said that after their residential, their teaching was more kinesthetic and practical, and involved more moving around.

They said, “It’s about trusting the kids a little bit more. Before the residential, I was probably a little bit afraid about doing that sort of thing, whereas now I know I can handle it, it’s fine and I’m getting much more positive results from it.”

A teacher from Bedford noted that a residential with a creative writer motivated the boys in her class to write, saying, “They now can’t stop – I’ve had to give them notebooks to take home so they can work on their diaries and novels!”

2. Gain new skills

Teaching assistants, teachers and school managers widely agree that residentials play a significant role in their professional development, in particular through the opportunities to take on additional responsibility.

They also present the opportunity to develop planning and organisation, evaluation and volunteer management skills.

“I was the kind of person who didn’t camp, that wasn’t my kind of thing,” reports one teacher from the focus group.

“But having been involved over the years and seeing how much the teachers and staff get from it, and what an amazing opportunity it is for our kids, it’s been the most amazing experience.” 

It’s not just class teachers who can soak up the benefits of staffing residentials either, as one Learning Away coordinator explains:

“A teaching assistant was the lead coordinator for our most recent camp and she’s going to continue with that role. It’s about bringing people in where they have strengths that we might not have seen in school.”

3. Bond with pupils

Residentials give you space to discover things about your students you can’t see in the classroom.

During the Learning Away programme, the trusting relationships developed between staff and students on residentials meant that children often shared more about themselves, which enabled staff to better understand their behaviour.

Staff noted that residentials provided a context where they could learn from each other how to manage more-challenging behaviour, and that they also continued this learning (particularly within the residential staff group) back in school.

“Knowing your students and having a history together gives you new ways to support or challenge them back at school,” said one member of staff. “They can tell you anything when they’ve seen you in pyjamas!”

A headteacher notes that they saw their staff developing skills in personalising learning and making it more engaging and relevant to their pupils. “This gives children experiential learning and skills they can take with them into adulthood,” they said.

4. Get to know staff

The high-trust relationships built between staff on residentials have long-lasting impacts at both professional and personal levels.

At one school, a residential encouraged teaching assistants to develop a supportive network once back at school. The focus group member noted, “They notice when others are struggling, even without anybody saying anything. They pick up each other’s slack, which didn’t happen before. The effect has been really noticeable.”

Residentials give adults the opportunity to work with staff from other subject areas or year groups, as well as spend extended time with each other both during planning sessions – within and across schools – and on residentials themselves.

5. Create a community

The sense of community and the memorability of experiences on residentials helps to boost your cohesion and a sense of belonging in your school, both on the residential and afterwards.

On the Learning Away programme, staff and students put this down to teamwork, stronger relationships and getting to know people with whom they did not normally work.

One staff member said, “As a teacher, the biggest impact has been having the confidence to organise learning outside and using the outdoors in my day-to-day practice.”

Another noted that working with children in a different environment highlighted gaps in staff’s knowledge when it came to the children as individuals.

“It showed how little we had explored their leadership skills, their ability to innovate, their fears, their co-operative skills (or lack of them!). Staff involved in the project brought this new knowledge back with them.”

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