2016 Annual Conference

This session features a non-verbal, theory-to-practice leadership training exercise liberally adapted from OSS training ideas for adult learners in a Group Leadership and Consultation course. Students worked in teams of four outdoors for two-hours to surmount a set of environmental obstacles while working through a problem collaboratively and non-verbally.

Leaders, professors, administrators, and managers interested in innovative ways to motivate adult learners to get along and build/renew skills
Higher education faculty who teach leadership or counseling courses that include self-assessment as related to communication patterns, both problematic and deleterious as well as those that promote group efficacy
Individuals who work with ELL learners with spoken language issues that inhibit collaborative learning
Leadership trainers and counselors as well as professors who believe in teaching strategy, communication, creative problem solving, risk-taking, tolerance, and resiliency as tenets of leadership
All of the above individuals who get bored easily

This session addresses AAACE’s conference theme, “the rich landscape of adult learning,” by literally incorporating outdoor environments in Group Leadership course instruction. Featuring theory-to-practice training opportunities derived from military Officer Survival School, student team-groups hone multidimensional leadership skills and qualities through non-verbal strategic experiences by learning how to observe, identify, communicate, and rely on collaborative strengths without talking.
In the 21st century, leaders need to be multidimensional, versatile, nimble, and smart in addressing and negotiating problems collaboratively toward identifying creative solutions quickly. Field scholarship shows leadership benefits from appreciation of diversity and skill in recognizing nuances through observation and communication. By leaving indoor classrooms to explore leadership intelligences-- e.g., bodily-kinesthetic, spatial, and non-verbal communication-- in the literal field-landscape, students learn powerfully through simple yet challenging physical tasks that require coordination, identifying and depending on others’ strengths in collaboration, and intense communication in creative non-verbal ways.
Another facet of this innovative outdoor pedagogy involves use of digital media to record student groups for extending in-person experience indoors through objective viewing and reflecting on behaviors, decision points, and leadership characteristics of each participant in relation to group outcomes, with consideration of action plans for altering non-verbal communication patterns to gain leadership effectiveness.