Assessment Type 2: Experiences in Natural Environments (50%)

Students undertake two tasks that include documented evidence collected and annotated when planning, experiencing, and reflecting on outdoor activities or journeys in natural environments. Students may refer to this evidence to inform Assessment Type 3: Connections with Natural Environments.

Students have at least one opportunity to plan, lead, and facilitate an activity or journey (or part thereof) with consideration of appropriate leadership styles, planning, risk assessment, decision-making, and use of interpersonal skills. Students use peer-assessment and self-assessment, together with reflective practice to evaluate development of their planning, practical skills, risk management, self-reliance, leadership, and facilitation skills.

Self-reliant activities should occur when students are ready to engage in decision-making, planning, and outdoor activities with independence.

Through experiences engaging in activities and journeys in natural environments (refer to the learning framework for minimum requirements), students develop and apply relevant planning, personal, and practical skills in:

• interpersonal relationships and collaboration — including responsible leadership and decision-making
• critical and creative thinking when planning, designing, leading, facilitating, reflecting on, analysing, and evaluating outdoor experiences
• practical outdoor activities
• observation and data collection
• sustainable practices relevant to specific environments
• risk and safety management
• self-reliance and self-regulation.

Assessment tasks may focus on aspects of human interactions, personal growth and development of capabilities and outdoor skills, and strategies for environmental sustainability, for example:

• use and application of outdoor-industry risk-management tools
• planning for safe and sustainable outdoor activities and journeys
• self-assessment and/or peer assessment to gather evidence to support reflective practice of development of personal growth, group collaboration, and leadership skills
• design and use of skills audit of practical outdoor skills for use throughout outdoor activities and journeys to apply reflective practice, analyse and evaluate individual progression, areas for improvement, and strategies for improvement
• journal or diary of experiences, observations, personal reflections, and suggested strategies in relation to environmental sustainability and management
• collection of information, data, and notes to capture thoughts, reflections, feelings, and observations about personal experiences in natural environments throughout and across a range of outdoor experiences.

Students may present evidence of their learning in various formats, for example:

• journals or skills folios to collect evidence using technology, e.g. photos, movie clips, on-screen recordings, blogs, vlogs, annotations
• written reports including self-assessment and peer-assessment tools, and reflective practice models
• multimodal presentations.

Students complete two tasks. The combined evidence should comprise a maximum of 2500 words if written, or 15 minutes if oral, or the equivalent in multimodal form (where 6 minutes is equivalent to 1000 words).

For this assessment type, students provide evidence of their learning primarily in relation to the following assessment design criteria:

• planning and application
• evaluation and reflective practice.