Dilworth’s Mangatāwhiri Campus is home to our outdoor programme, “Te Haerenga” (The Journey), an exceptional outdoor learning experience that is a vital part of learning at Dilworth. In fact, we believe so passionately in the benefits of Learning in The Outdoors (LiTO) at Dilworth that LITO is a pillar of our three-strand curriculum, alongside our academic curriculum and wellbeing curriculum, Ako Puāwaitanga.
Students get to explore the outdoors each year during their Dilworth journey from Year 7 to Year 13, with each year building on the five essential skills over time. But the benefits of LITO extend well beyond skills development; the experience provides students with opportunities to develop on so many levels, building self-belief, confidence, resilience, emotional strength, and ultimately, leadership ability.
One of the things our students say they love is the chance to explore all over the upper North Island through adventures like tramping, caving, kayaking, and climbing, including visiting places many have never seen before, such as the Pinnacles, Hunua Ranges, National Park, Kinloch, Taupō, and Rotorua.
But when you talk to the students, the real magic lies in the sense of personal achievement, with many far exceeding what they believed they were capable of when they set out.
Last term, we decided to see for ourselves!
So we joined a Year 10 Class on the first day of their Peak Experience programme. It’s a four-week programme based at Dilworth’s Mangatāwhiri campus that includes the Tough Guy challenge, kayaking, rock climbing, and tramping. For all students, tramping activities also count towards the Duke of Edinburgh Bronze award.
We arrived nice and early to a hive of activity with students packing for their adventures—in fact, many were learning to pack! Busy finding the right boots, clothing, packs, and sleeping bags and refreshing the use equipment.
But before they went on their adventures, that afternoon kicked off with the Tough Guy Challenge—the stuff Dilworth legends are made of, and many students were excited to get out there.
Standing safely at the top of the bank near a tree, we watched all the action as our intrepid students and their equally intrepid instructors tackled the Tough Guy Challenge – a challenging course loop track through the bush, swampy river valley and farmland over, under and through obstacles. There were quite a few funny moments as students recovered the odd long-lost shoe from past adventures along the way!
By this stage, we weren’t tempted to join them in the mud, which was getting muddier… but many of their instructors did. We asked Dan Fieten, Head of Curriculum at Mangatāwhiri. We asked him what something like the Tough Guy Challenge does for students’ confidence on the first day of the programme.
“It's essential students understand, right from the very first activity (the 'Tough Guy' challenge), that they mustn’t let doubt hold them back from discovering what they're really made of. Our Week One mantra, 'All in, all out,' reminds them that authentic effort and meaningful reward always go together”.
But most important of all is what our students think. We asked a few of them if they could keep a diary for us as they went about the next few weeks. It was so great to hear directly from them.
These are some of their themes:
Tough Guy Challenge
“Today we did the tough guy challenge, an activity where shoes were lost and everyone came together to help each other, and where you get really muddy.”
“The tough parts were Richard’s hole, the concrete mixer, and a part where you can’t stand - trying to stand would make you sink, so you had to army crawl.”
Seeing their self-reflection come through in their diaries as they built confidence was pretty cool.
“On the first day - Tough Guy... I thought I wasn't going to do very well, just my physical abilities and, like, what I thought about my physical abilities. But once I got into it, I just kept going and going and going and I realised this is actually pretty easy! And I wanted to do two laps and ended up doing four laps. So I was really happy with that. If you have a good mindset you know, you can do well”.
Teamwork
“Probably talking with people. Like, I feel here when we're at LITO I could like communicate with everyone”.
“Teamwork that’s something. Like, really essential”.
Visiting new places
“Today is the day we start our practice tramp for our Duke of Edinburgh. We started our day in the van, where we drove through Paeroa (the place where L&P is from).
“Later on we would go to see the cool glow-worms in the bush”.
Learning new skills
“Calculating how long your walk will take and figuring out like how the compass works..”
“Like plant identification was really interesting to learn, like, just realising that there are so many plants around you and once you know them, you just can see them”.
“The mountain biking, especially Turangi…which was fun downhill. I learnt all the different things, like how to do all the berms and what do to when there are challenges, like boms”.
“Kayaking stood out to me, because of the cool views”
And the challenges
“Rock climbing, it was challenging at the start, but you got the hang of it. It was mentally challenging but also physically challenging”.
“The tramping was difficult for me, my mates helped me overcome that, they gave me support and helped me go forward”.
“Today we woke up a bit early to start our trip to Taupō where we would start our qualifying tramp for DoE. Our goal was to walk to our campsite at Kawakawa (Bay) in a couple of hours with minimal places to take a rest”.
And of course, food was mentioned a lot!
“Food was yum! We got cereal, chicken wraps, butter chicken and smoothies”
“Cereal, sausages and beans for breakfast”
“After all the activities, we finished with a yummy dinner pizza! And watched a cool movie on climbing”
Food, while a huge positive theme throughout their journey, sounded like a leveller on the tramp!
“Today, we started the day by making breakfast. It was a sad box of Weetbix with a crumpled packet of white milk powder and a bowl of water left overnight to kill bacteria”.
Getting first-hand experience of Learning in The Outdoors at Dilworth was fantastic. A huge thank you to the students and instructors who let us be part of this first day—we loved it. Special thanks to the students who gave us their insights.
We look forward to coming out again!
