As schools encounter falling engagement, rising anxiety and disconnected learners, educators argue outdoor experiences offer a powerful wellbeing reset – strengthening relationships, building resilience and supporting students back into learning.
In 2026, school camps, excursions and outdoor learning are being reframed as essential wellbeing interventions, particularly for students who missed critical social development during the disrupted pandemic years.
Outdoor Education Australia President Mr Peter Kent, a long-serving school principal whose ACT outdoor school hosts around 15,000 students annually, says the wellbeing rationale is now clearer than ever.
“Schools are noticing post-COVID that students who were locked down for a longer period are demonstrating generally less resilience and poorer wellbeing, and that’s not surprising,” he says.
“Kids missed out on opportunities to go outside and play and get dirty and muddy. They missed that formative period where they would just do it without thinking.”
For Mr Kent, well-designed outdoor experiences help redress exactly that loss. “There needs to be structured opportunities where kids are taken outside their comfort zone.”
While excursions reconnect students with the real world beyond their school gates, camps remain a unique space for sustained social connection, meaningful challenge and the kind of shared experiences that classroom structures rarely allow.
“Students bond on a school camp,” Mr Kent says. “They get concentrated time with each other. They do trust exercises and teamwork activities. They become more independent.”
For younger students especially, even a day excursion can be transformative simply because it expands the boundaries of what “school” means.
The wellbeing value, he argues, sits as much in those social and emotional shifts as in any structured learning outcomes.
The engagement challenge schools can’t ignore
At Federation University in Victoria, Senior Lecturer Dr Josh Ambrosy works closely with schools, teachers and curriculum designers across the Year 7–10 space.
Much of his focus is on articulating where outdoor education fits and why it matters, even though it isn’t a formally recognised learning area in the Australian Curriculum.
He says student wellbeing and school attendance are now deeply intertwined, and outdoor experiences can make a measurable difference.
“A lot of the data coming out of secondary schools at the moment suggests we have an engagement issue,” Dr Ambrosy explains. “We have a higher rate of truancy than we would like, and the data tends to get a bit worse each year.”
Declining attendance is not evenly distributed. Students from more complex backgrounds – those experiencing disadvantage, economic pressures or disrupted learning – are more likely to disengage.
The reasons vary, but Dr Ambrosy points to a helpful framework from a recent School Improvement Tool literature review, completed the by Australian Council for Educational Research.
“They identified three key components to helping students engage in school: engaging school experiences, appropriate support for student wellbeing, and appropriate behavioural responses. When they work together, they drive engagement.”
Camps and outdoor programs, he says, naturally align with these factors.
“Take a typical Year 9 program. Students go for a week-long hike with a teacher and an outdoor leader. They’re doing something naturally engaging, because it’s in the outdoors,” Dr Ambrosy says. “They’re curious about the world. They get to experience it – not just learn about it.”
But critically, they also benefit from adult care and mentoring in a radically different context.
“You’ve got adults modelling behaviour, having conversations, supporting students through challenges. It’s structured in a way that really juxtaposes school. That’s exactly why it’s so positive at supporting engagement.”
He has seen how the relational impact carries back into classrooms.
“Students often return feeling safer and more connected. They’ve built relationships with peers and teachers. That shift can influence how they attend school afterwards.”
Challenge by choice: Agency as wellbeing
If there is one concept that captures the wellbeing power of outdoor learning, it may be ‘challenge by choice’.
Mr Kent describes it simply: “It’s always up to the student how far they go with the challenge. We encourage them, but they’re in control.”
On a climbing wall, that might mean choosing how high to climb. On a flying fox, students decide how far back they want to be pulled. On a ropes course, they determine how far to push themselves.
“Gone are the days of everyone being forced to do it, whether they want to or not,” Mr Kent says.
Why does this matter?
Because for many children – especially those anxious, unsure, or still rebuilding confidence – agency is key to wellbeing.
“We talk about comfort zones. You’ll choose to go to the edge of your comfort zone, and something magical happens there: your comfort zone expands,” Mr Kent says.
He offers a scenario familiar to many teachers.
“A child climbs halfway up a wall and feels proud. Later at dinner they tell their friend they went all the way – because in their mind, they’re ready to go further next time.”
The learning, he says, extends far beyond the ropes course.
“There are things in life that are completely safe but feel dangerous, like the first day of high school, or asking someone out on a date. By going on camp and being put in these safe-danger situations, students become more prepared for life in general. They’re less likely to avoid school or deny themselves opportunities.”
Mr Kent calls this “safe danger”, a paradox that resonates strongly with teachers supporting anxious students in the post-COVID era.
Making outdoor learning accessible
While wellbeing is a compelling reason to prioritise outdoor experiences, cost remains a barrier.
“Because outdoor education sits outside the core curriculum, schools – especially in the government sector – can charge families. That can create equity issues,” Dr Ambrosy says.
Many schools rely heavily on equity funding or excursion support programs. The Victorian Government, for example, is expanding its Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund, but Dr Ambrosy says the need still outpaces the support.
Mr Kent agrees cost can block access but points to a bold ACT solution.
“At the beginning of 2025, the ACT Government started what’s called a free camp initiative for public primary schools,” he explains. “Every school gets to go on a free camp every year.”
The motivation was simple: students who needed camps the most were the ones missing out.
“Families often feel too proud to ask for help. So the government said, ‘This is valuable, it’s worthwhile for everyone, and we’re going to fund it’.”
According to Mr Kent, every ACT public primary school has taken it up.
Teachers, he says, regularly tell him that five, six or seven children in each year level would not have been able to afford the experience without the program.
For those students, the wellbeing effects are profound.
Schools that move classes outside regularly report behavioural improvements too.
“In Canberra, occupational violence is an issue. But every school that routinely takes students outside says it reduces angry kids and incidents of occupational violence,” Mr Kent notes.
“They credit it to kids being outside, connecting in nature, and improving their wellbeing.”
Schools don’t need expensive camps to improve wellbeing. Both educators stress that outdoor learning can be integrated into everyday teaching. A science class might assess the health of a local creek. A geography class might walk the neighbourhood to study population demographics. A PE class might take up trail running on a local path.
Even taking a class outside to read has a small wellbeing benefit, but the deeper gains come when teachers use the outdoors as the learning context.
Walks on Country: wellbeing, inclusion and authentic learning
At Bonython Primary School in the ACT, outdoor learning has become a cornerstone of wellbeing, inclusion and cultural integrity for the school’s youngest learners. What began two years ago as a team of three kindergarten teachers working to combine their strengths has grown into a Walks on Country program that shapes both the emotional climate of the week and the learning that follows.
Kindergarten teachers Karen, Inge and Rachel work with a cohort of 45 five-year-olds, supported by Acting Principal Ms Amanda Hawkins. Together, they have designed a program that is grounded in cultural respect, child-led exploration, and the belief that authentic learning extends far beyond the classroom walls.
The program emerged organically when the three teachers began working together. Each brought a specialist strength – cultural integrity, visual arts, and early years expertise.
“We wanted to do something that had some meaning and also connect them to the land,” the team explains. “It’s grown and evolved over two years, and it will continue to do that as we educate ourselves and meet the needs of the students in front of us.”
The Walks on Country take place every Monday, selected deliberately to support student wellbeing. As the team notes, Mondays can be “wobbly” for young children, whether due to separation from parents, fatigue, or the general shift back into school routines. Being outdoors offers a natural reset.
“Going out on Country helped stabilise our kids in a wellbeing kind of way for the rest of the week,” they say. “It was really good for everybody’s mental health and wellbeing just to get out on Country.”
The sessions run across the middle learning block – between play and eating breaks –giving students a large uninterrupted period to immerse themselves in nature. Although the duration is consistent, the location changes as the year progresses. The children begin with a short walk just outside the school gate before gradually building stamina and confidence to reach more distant sites: shaded slopes, a second tree-lined area, an underpass, a grove of she-oaks, and finally a wetland pond around 700 metres from the school.
This gradual progression is more than physical. Teachers describe the children’s “belief that they can walk the distance” growing alongside their emotional confidence.
Each session begins with a circle gathering. The children pause, listen and observe what they hear, smell and notice in their surroundings. They offer a simple Acknowledgment of Country and then ask Country for permission to play.
“What is Country offering us today?” teachers prompt. Answers range from “the sun” to “airplanes” to “the heat”. If the response from nature feels unsettled – “a massive gust of wind”, for example – the group may decide to turn back.
This practice blends cultural integrity with emotional attunement. Teachers complete a safety check while children settle, scanning for snakes, glass, or environmental changes. A formal risk assessment supports the process, as do parent permissions and careful preparation around toileting and routines.
Importantly, the teachers take nothing with them except hats, water bottles in summer, and a small trolley with spare clothes. “Nature is your resource,” they emphasise.
Wellbeing foundations: emotional language and inclusion
Before walking out the gate, significant work is done to build children’s emotional vocabulary. The team uses the Zones of Regulation, helping children name and express how they feel. Students from the school’s small-group inclusion program also join the walks, strengthening belonging and expanding access.
The teachers describe how the experience reframes learning: “Just because you’re not in the classroom doesn’t mean it isn’t learning.”
According to Ms Hawkins, the impact extends well beyond Monday.
“Although they have this beautiful experience on Monday, it’s not isolated. I see it through the week – in the writing, the letter learning, the phonics, the stories they read, and their oral language. It becomes a stepping stone for more learning.”
Students begin to notice the world differently: rubbish becomes “damaging Country”, local places gain significance, and their reflections carry home to families. Bonython now applies this philosophy across the school.
“Every student from preschool to Year 6 goes outside the gates and experiences outdoor learning,” Ms Hawkins says. “The school is just the building. Education happens anywhere.”
