Teaching Kids about Survival

[Sunset Sam]

I was having “one of those days” yesterday. I found myself pondering the differences between local kids and tourist kids. I’m sure you already know where this is going: SS is feeling old and cranky again.

This weekend is the height of our summer tourist season and is viewed with apprehension by the local SAR people, because it seems as though every year everyone gets called out to find some youngster who has wandered off from its parents campsite, vehicle, cabin, etc. The unwritten rule of thumb is that there is about 4 hours to find a lost tourist child before it becomes a potential recovery (the parents are of course not informed of the rule). Overnight is deemed something like a 50-50 chance for a non-local under 15.

In contrast, a local kid missing in the mountains is a different deal. Parents are concerned but not really worried until the child doesn’t show up by midnight. Except in Dec-Feb., it is expected that the child will survive the night ok, but may have an injury which is slowing them down.
If the youngster does not show up by morning, the “jungle drums” somehow are at work and there will be a bunch of horse trailers showing up unsolicited with riders prepared to spend 24 hours in the saddle “just taking a look around.” Usually the kid shows up by her/himself, having gotten delayed looking for a lost dog or cow pony. (A cow pony suitable for a six year old local cowboy can be a 17 hand, green-broke gelding.) Ranch families often don’t even call the sheriff (which is what triggers a formal SAR response) until evening of the second day. Ranch girls are every bit as capable as the boys, so when I talk about cowboys consider me as meaning both boys and girls.

So I am standing there at this public gathering place listening to these whiny, self-important, overly-funded brats and wondering how they were ever going to learn anything in even the most rudimentary way about survival skills, stuff which our cowboys and farm kids seem to absorb very early. These tourist kids are clearly not going to learn it from their parents, who themselves are whiny, self-important, and overly-funded. Boy and Girl Scouts used to fill this role pretty well; but my sense is that this is not so common as it was when I was a youngster. So, how does learning survival happen for children in the US? The great majority of children don’t grow up on farms and ranches anymore. And most of them are not lucky enough to have parents or grandparents like members on this Forum.

I think I am going to shut up, saddle up, and take a ride.

[crashdive123]

So, how does learning survival happen for children in the US?

I believe that "survival skills" from somebody growing up on a ranch or farm in rural areas will differ vastly from those that grow up in urban areas with little or no exposure to the wilderness. For each - if they are plucked out of the environment from which they are comfortable and plopped into a strange one, they will both struggle.

While we may not think of it as "survival training" those living in urban environments have similar skill sets, but vastly different methods of achieving their goals IMO.

Whether a family from the city is headed to the wilderness for a vacation or the family from the wilderness is headed to the city for a vacation, both need to be aware of their surroundings and do their homework. Knowing how to avoid a moose or grizz attack may save a life, just as knowing how to avoid an MS13 member or drug deal on a street corner.

[hunter63]

I guess it has always been difficult to deal with different cultures and backrounds.

Grew up in a tourist area, I was a townie (3001 people, when I moved out at 18, I crossed out the "1").....so was still different that the farm boys (girls).
The big thing was drowning as there was a lot of lakes, rivers, trout streams for boating fishing swimming, and of course camp grounds to stay in.

Went I went to the big city (wasn't all that big) to seek my fortune...I felt out of place as far a neighborhoods and such....So I guess it's what you make of it.

Many friends took off into the world to go to collage, the service, out of town jobs....and didn't seem to be much difference in how many people turned into outdoors people, or how many didn't.

For some it was just easier.......but people end up where they are supposed to be....and for some that's means easier, and for some harder.

[WolfVanZandt]

Crash, I think you're right. Survival is a matter of what you're trying to survive. Many inner city kids are not whiney - they're trying to survive a harsh existence just like a person lost in enemy territory and people who wonder why they have that "attitude" do so because they're not part of their world - If they were, they'd know. The whiney kids are generally whiney because, in their world, the squeaky wheel gets oiled - they're learning to survive in the business world. The cowboy and farmer kids have to deal with nature so that's what they're learning to survive.

The complication is that, the more all these worlds intersect, and in this world they're intersecting more and more, the more people need general survival strategies and most of them (including the cowboy and farm kids) just don't have them. Can you imagine taking a cowboy kid and dropping them into downtown Miami? It'd make a great movie but the movie probably wouldn't be very realistic.

[Winter]

Interesting.

Kids here have a required wilderness survival trip.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schoenbar_Middle_School
"Camping and Survival Trips

Annual activities unique to Schoenbar Middle School are the camping trip, required for all 7th graders, and the survival trip required for all 8th graders, both of which take place every spring. Groups of students are divided by gender and desired level of difficulty and sent to various campsites and wilderness areas on Revillagigedo and surrounding islands. Throughout each school year in preparation for these trips, students are given practice and instruction in various survival skills, from fire-building to the harvesting of limpets and sea cucumbers for food."

My children had fun except I always got pissed off at the supply list. No fixed blade knives has always bothered me. Fixed blades are safer then folders, IMO.

[hunter63]

That's outstanding......more practical courses are really in demand as life styles change and the old self reliant ways are left behind.

Sadly or maybe gladly, the schools (and of course Scouting) are the ones that provide them these days....where it used to be the parents and families.

[Faiaoga]

Winter: I am pleased to hear that your school district at least makes a good attempt at outdoor skills training. I hope this program does not face reduction due to finances or due to pressure to make school a standardized test preparation factory.

One continuing complaint I have is the lack of practical skills training in schools. Where I have taught, water safety and swimming skills should be a part of the physical education program but never seem to be included. At the very least, schools can sponsor and support Scouts and similar groups that teach practical and useful skills.

[1stimestar]

My goal is to teach my kids what I can AND teach them a thought process where they can figure out what they need to do when in an unknown circumstance. I can't teach them everything but I can teach them to think things through, come up with plans A, B, and C, slow down and consider priorities and consequences. I can also teach them enough so that they become self confident, responsible adults (hopefully). Other then that, they are on their own. When you think about kids wandering off in the wilderness or in the city, it's the thought process that may be able to save them, not necessarily individual skills. Of course, skills are handy and can make a big difference but if they don't stop long enough to think, then they are in big trouble in either location.

[hunter63]

My goal is to teach my kids what I can AND teach them a thought process where they can figure out what they need to do when in an unknown circumstance. I can't teach them everything but I can teach them to think things through, come up with plans A, B, and C, slow down and consider priorities and consequences. I can also teach them enough so that they become self confident, responsible adults (hopefully). Other then that, they are on their own. When you think about kids wandering off in the wilderness or in the city, it's the thought process that may be able to save them, not necessarily individual skills. Of course, skills are handy and can make a big difference but if they don't stop long enough to think, then they are in big trouble in either location.

You pretty much nailed it.....tried to give some rep....need to spread it around.....
Some one jump in here?

[crashdive123]

Done.................

[LowKey]

It's the thinking part that most kids lack these days. They aren't taught to think things through and lately are only being "taught to the test."
Having a brain full of individual bits of knowledge is going to be useless unless they are taught how to use what they know to further their "education" on their own.

The other thing, about classes...call it a class and kids will zone out. What my dad and grandpa did was just let us do whatever they were doing. Being a suburb kid, neither rural or city I got to see both sides. Grandpa had a campground and at 10 I was manning the bar cutter used to mow the field grass in the campground and driving an old beater Ford pickup around the grounds. When we weren't traveling around by horse or ski-doo. Dad often took me on runs into the city either to visit a job site or to go to one of his many hidden wholesale food resources. He taught me what to look for on city streets and how not to look like a "mark."

We didn't have "classes" in starting a campfire but "hey kids would you like to try to start one using a bow drill, here's the parts have at it." Then next time, "why don't you see if you can find the parts for a bow drill" Or hey kids, we're having chicken for supper, go catch the lazy hen. Then next time, "why don't you take care of the lazy hen and we'll have chicken for supper." One time we had a Power Outage Weekend where Dad threw the breakers for everything except the deep freezer (I'm fairly certain he made sure the fridge was near to empty too, but part of the fun was what to do with what was in the fridge.)

"Hey dad, can you build us a go-cart?" "No." "Can we have this old snowblower motor?" "Sure." "Can you show us how to braze weld these axle pieces together?" "Absolutely." It was never a class. Always a game. Never wasteful, always useful. And he made us get at least most of the way there by ourselves.

Today, too many awards are given just for showing up breathing. Kids need to learn to fail, and they need to learn that failing is only one more experience gained on the way to succeeding.

[WolfVanZandt]

Aye, LowKey, that's what I'm talking about when I say, "peripatetic teaching". I figure you was with them earlier when they were doing those things......

[Rick]

It's the thinking part that most kids lack these days. They aren't taught to think things through and lately are only being "taught to the test."

That's always been true. Even more so if you attended a religion based school. Kids don't think anything through. The human brain doesn't even stop developing until 21-24 years old. I remember reading a very old book that stated you can't put an old man's head on a young man's shoulders. It's just as true today. As a kid, it was suggested to me more than once that I should use my head for more than just a hat rack.

@ Sunset - You are trying to smush them into your mold. There are a lot of folks that don't care about spending time in the outdoors and think that anyone that goes camping is a bit off center. Diversity has made us what we are and we are pretty darn good.

[WolfVanZandt]

It is true, and it has been for a very long time, but it shouldn't be. Kids can be taught to think and they're taught best by experience. What they can't be taught completely is self-control. That comes with maturity. The part of the brain that doesn't develop fully until the 20s (and I wonder if a large part of society ever gets full development anymore) is the frontal cortex - the centers of the brain responsible for things like impulse control, delayed gratification, focus of thought - general self-control. We can't make kids into mature adults but we should be showing them what it looks like and giving them the tools they can use when they "make it". They also need to value maturity - it needs to be something they look forward to. We seem to be living in a Toys-R-Us generation.

Diversity is a better part of us in my opinion. I like variation, even in my neighbors. A lot of people complain about "those darn kids making noise, the dogs all barking their brains out, that block party that goes on and on". I figure those are the sounds of life and I like them much better than the gunfire and people having screaming fights at 3:00 am I used to hear in Selma. But sociologists have been talking about the homogenizing of America for some time now. I'm not so sure we're doing all that darn good.

And if kids are going to leave the hood, they need to be equipped to survive where they're going. All kids need general survival skills that will serve them where ever they go. People travel today. They don't stay where they live. Even the poor people I knew in Selma visited their kinfolk in Detriot (brrrrr) and Chicago. What if the family has a wreck in the middle of Kansas and one or both of the parents are injured? What if the family gets ready to leave Rocky Mountain National Park at closing time and the car won't start? City people hike and camp in the mountains. And a significant subset do stupid anti-survival things. "What ifs" aren't an issue if people are taught to handle them and that training is much more important than traditional schooling.

[Sunset Sam]

I think there are a bunch of great comments here. I see that I expressed my self poorly in the OP.

[WolfVanZandt]

Funny that I should run into this great discussion about deep though in very young children.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/children

One of the tutorials I'm working on is one on philosophy (specifically, how to do it) and I was looking for information on "teaching philosophy".

Actually, Sam, I've made very similar comments. One thing that bothers me is that most people couldn't survive being isolated 5 miles from civilization. It is true that most kids now days will rarely need to be able to survive such an isolation short of an apocalyptic event (which I don't discount as a future possibility at all). But there is a possibility that any of them may experience a situation sometime in their life where they will have to face just that sort of situation. Unless they turn into a plant, they'll be traveling and traveling implies moving into novel situations.

There is another facet of the "tourist kid" phenomenon. I am an inactive member of the Christian Motorcyclists Association and, as such, I used to travel around and help the CMA in missionary activities which involved, among other things, physical support for secular bike rallies. I found out during Bike Week at Daytona Beach, that the town loves to see the bikers come to town. They also love to see the racing fans that arrive the next week. What they don't look forward to is spring break when the college students arrive. They're (as a group) destructive, obnoxious, and arrogant (because they know that, when (not if) they get in trouble, they're rich daddies will come and get them out of jail with little further consequences.)

My own experience is that this is not true of all young people. I would be shocked to find that any of the young people I'm tutoring (obviously the fruits of well-to-do parents since the parents can afford to have their children tutored) would engage in such behavior. I am honestly impressed by the overall caliber of these kids. But, obviously, there are large groups of children that are missing something important in their education (whether by the schools, by the families, or by the communities they live in - one of the few things I agree with Hillary Clinton on is that it takes a village to raise a child.)

[Rick]

I'm not so sure we're doing all that darn good.

I probably should have taken my comment a bit further. I think we ARE doing pretty darn good. For the past decade I've watched young men and women demonstrate to the world...once again...that the good ole U.S.A. can handle itself in the worst of times. All around the world. A lot of them are just kids. 18, 19 and 20 year olds. I would be willing to bet if the news media concentrated their reporting on the good things kids do instead of the bad we'd have a completely different opinion. When all you are presented with is the ugly it doesn't take long to develop a scotoma to the beauty in the world. And once you develop that scotoma you spend all your time justifying it. It's no different than the pessimist that gets up in the morning and proclaims today is going to be a crappy day. He will spend all day looking for things to prove he is right. And guess what kind of a day he will have. Once you think kids are a problem all you begin seeing are the things that prove you are right.

[WolfVanZandt]

I think I made it pretty clear that I don't think kids are the problem, Rick. Note the comment that I made about the kids I tutor. I do think there are problems and have always been problems with our education system. People worry about population growth and the news media sunnily reports that we have a 10% reduction in birth rate. At first blush, that may sound good but not if you consider that it's a 10% reduction in an already huge birth rate. Population density is still increasing - quite a lot. Kids, regardless of how great they might be as human beings, still don't know how to handle situations when they move out of familiar territory and they need to. And as long as tourist spots hate to see kids coming because they wreck the places (just because they can) and jeopardize their own safety and that of others because they don't know how to take care of themselves, there's a problem that needs to be addressed.

I've been in the social services system for 20 years and just retired. My advice to people trying to obtain social services is that you have to ride social workers like race horses to get them to do their jobs. It also helps to know the magical mantra, "Could I have the phone number or email address of your supervisor." Organizations are buying up providers of whole regions - organizations that don't cooperate with social services. People can't get help for their elderly relatives in many areas. Many people can't get any sense at all from utility providers when they're trying to find out why their bills are ridiculously high. Doctors remain 20 years behind current research and are, thus, using woefully outdated medical practice. Professionals that remain professional are having a more and more difficult time retaining their professionalism.

I was sardonically amused the other day reading Dr. Mortimer Adler's Great Ideas from the Great Books at how much has changed since he wrote the book in 1963. He predicted that the working class would have more and more leisure time (a prediction that surprisingly didn't materialize), and he worried that people would be losing their jobs to automation. I wonder if he would be surprised at how many people would lose their jobs because companies would move their holdings to other countries?

Honestly, "we" are not doing well. And it starts in school. At one time, schools were considered a place where good productive citizens were produced. And good citizens - the kind that support values that will build instead of break a country, are necessary for a healthy democracy. Now, there are problems as to what constitutes a "good citizen" but one thing is certain, the mantra of "You can't teach morality in school," is a certain means to a disastrous end. Our current emphasis of keeping up technologically with other countries (which we're not doing all that well anyway - it's sorta like our obsession with physical health while we're some of the most unhealthy people among developed countries) at the expense of seeing to the moral development of our citizens is going to destroy us.

[Tokwan]

I first took my sons out for camping when they were 5 and 8 yrs old. When they were 12 and 15, I decided its high time the learn the fundamentals of survival...at school, when they are lost in the city and in case they are in a jungle, separated from their school activity.
Both are now 22 and 19..and they are 3rd Dan Black Belt and 1s Dan Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do respectively. Both have good thinking and able to make decisions better. Teaching them about survival, instill them to think, be disciplined and patient. With the martial arts, and daily life knowledge and their survival knowledge, makes them able to access a situation and take the next step of action. The elder one is in the University now while the younger one is in High School...neither have ever been in a fight at their schools or uni.

[Winter]

I probably should have taken my comment a bit further. I think we ARE doing pretty darn good. For the past decade I've watched young men and women demonstrate to the world...once again...that the good ole U.S.A. can handle itself in the worst of times. All around the world. A lot of them are just kids. 18, 19 and 20 year olds. I would be willing to bet if the news media concentrated their reporting on the good things kids do instead of the bad we'd have a completely different opinion. When all you are presented with is the ugly it doesn't take long to develop a scotoma to the beauty in the world. And once you develop that scotoma you spend all your time justifying it. It's no different than the pessimist that gets up in the morning and proclaims today is going to be a crappy day. He will spend all day looking for things to prove he is right. And guess what kind of a day he will have. Once you think kids are a problem all you begin seeing are the things that prove you are right. [/COLOR]

Well said Rick. The more painkillers I'm on, the more sense you make.