Outdoor education activities

'Let nature be your teacher'

William Wordsworth

Some adults were concerned that school camps interfered with traditional teaching or led to immoral behaviour. Others thought parents could best educate their children in outdoor activities. However, by the 1970s outdoor education, as it became known, was an almost universally accepted element of New Zealand schooling. At both primary and secondary levels, camping was by far the most common single outdoor activity. In 1999 it became a formal part of the school curriculum. 

Source:  Mark Derby, 'Camping - School camps', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/camping/page-3 (accessed 22 July 2020)