Enhancing Independent Living Skills of Young Generations through

Organized Camping Activities

Masadliahani Masduki
Sekolah Kebangsaan Seri Bali, 85400 Chaah, Johor.

Corresponding e-mail: adliq@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT

Activities outside the classroom are equally important as those in the classroom. Students
development cannot be achieved if the children only rely on the classrooms instructions.
Therefore, camping is one of the activities being held outside the classroom context to
provide students with living skills, teaching them to be independent and capable of facing
any challenge in their daily life, especially in the era of the 21st century. Todays young
generations are very attached to gadgets and pampered with advanced technologies that
make them less capable of facing challenges, very dependent to their families and
technologies in doing daily activities, and also lack of problem-solving skills. Thus,
camping is seen as a structured or organized activities that can bring children to nature, free
from tech gadgets, learn to be independent, and able to face any challenge with good
problem-solving skills. This study focused on observation of the camping program at the
Seri Mendapat Elementary School, Melaka. This study also examined the effectiveness of
the camping program through interviews with the participants. Participants were 99
standard four, five and six students. The results revealed that camping could turn students
to be holistic, manageable, independent, discipline and also enhance their living skills.
However, the study also showed that during the camping program, students were hard to
follow instructions accordingly.

Keywords: camping, independent, living skills, social

INTRODUCTION
Globalization has a very significant impact and influence on the behaviour and the way of
living of young generations. In this era of globalization, various forms of online
communication such as Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, Youtube and Yahoo make gadgets
such as smart phones and tablets as must have items for every youth that replace the
traditional ways of communication and social. It is undeniable that technology has brought
about a change in people's lives. The emergence of technology has brought many benefits
to the youth of today as the medium for games, to find information, education, socialization
and to establish computer literacy. However, the technology also bring bad impacts towards
youngsters like the decreasing of face to face communication, reducing the time spent with
family and friends and also lacking of independent living skills. Youth would not know
how to do basic things at home like cooking, hand wash their clothes and heating their
foods manually as the results of modern technology. As the consequences, parents
nowadays rely on schools for their childrens growth.
In school, students growth can be develop in class but they were still not enough,
as due to time constraints, classroom instructions are focused more on the cognitive
developments. In these sense, students affective, psychomotor and social growth can be
develop through co-curricular activities. Effective co-curricular activities will help students
forget about the technology, especially gadgets and help them to focus on their social and
psychomotor development in a proper way.

INDEPENDENT LIVING SKILLS

Independent living is defined as those skills or tasks that contribute to the successful
independent functioning of an individual in adulthood (Cronin, 1996). These skills can be
categorized into the major areas related to our daily lives, such as household chores,
personal care and social. The desire to become self-sufficient is a natural part of growing
up for students. The acquisition of independent living skills can significantly impact a
students future and the quality of his or her life. The ultimate goal of independent living is
assisting individuals to live as independently as possible or desired through the choices

they make. Independent living needs vary greatly among students and actually there is a
wide continuum of skills leading to independence. Independent living skills will help
children to manage their own daily lives without the help of others using the concept of do
it yourself or DIY.

ORGANIZED CAMPING ACTIVITIES

Activities in the camping program were arranged to build positive developments in all
aspects of students life; physically, emotionally, spiritually and also socially. An organized
camping activity is the activities that are structured and planned in a camping program for
certain purposes such as to enhance the independent living skills, to develop selfconfidence or team building. Esa, Yunus & Kaprawi (2004) and Abdul Rahim (1999) listed
the benefits of participating in extra-curricular programs including camping, which is to
foster generic skills so that students can become independent. According to Khamis (1993),
Mei (2003) and Abdul Rahim (1999), camping activities could educate students to be more
responsible, considerate, tolerant, ambitious, help each other, care about their hygiene, selfconfident, think creatively, rational, skillful, self-reliance and the most important thing is
independent. Besides that, students gain more benefits through camping program compared
to other co-curricular activities such as self-discipline, communications, interactions with
others and with the natural environment and also develop their physical and emotional
endurances (Kusin and Esa, 2014; Selamat et al., 2011; Hodes & Ozechoski, 2014).

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEMS

Most of school children nowadays are very attached to gadgets and pampered with
advanced technologies that make them less capable of facing challenges, very dependent to
their parents and technologies to do basic things in their daily routines, and also lack of
problem-solving skills. Furthermore, gadgets make them become inhibited, being less
social, loss their noble values and would facing psychosocial problems due to lack of

human interactions. If there is no action taken to help them to become independent, they
may be facing troubles or problems someday in their life.

METHODOLOGY
The camping program was held for two days and one night. Participants were 99 school
children (standard four, five and six) from Seri Mendapat Elementary School, Melaka.
During the camping program, they were thought on;
i)

Prepare simple foods (not relying on fast food)

ii)

Do basic household chores (hand wash own clothes, cleaning

equipments and environment)

iii)

Face to face interaction and communication skills (discussions within

group members)

iv)

Problems solving skills (students were given problems which they need
to solve within the groups)

v)

Survival skills such as raft building in groups, raft rowing individually

Along the program, students were led by a camp commandant and 14 advisers whereby
they were observed during the activities. Participants were to fill in the programs feedback
form. Interviews with the students were conducted after the program.

RESULT AND DISCUSSION

From the feedback form, 90% students claimed they have smart phones or tablets and 86 %
of them said they cannot be far apart from their gadgets. 98% students who were very
attached to their gadgets said they did not remember their smart phones or tablets during
the camping program. These meant that all the activities planned for the students were very
engaging and exciting, made them committed and focused on their tasks. About 96%
students indicated that they will join any camping program after this and 4% of the students
were not sure about that. These showed that the students had very exciting and fun

experiences during the program and wish to re-experience it later. 95% students found that
the duration of the program was not enough and should be lengthened to 3 days and two
nights. 4% students also claimed that the campings duration was too short and should be
lengthened to a week whilst 1% student said that the duration of the program was just nice.
These meant that the students felt not enough and expected more activities and challenges
during the program.

Through our observation, positive results could be seen throughout and after the
program. Among the changes in behaviour shown by the students were;
i)

Self-discipline
Students demonstrate good discipline in terms of time and following the rules
and regulations.

ii)

Manageable
Students demonstrate very good time management, group and selfmanagement.

iii)

Team work
Students built a raft and tents in groups, performed group presentations together.
Students were able to solve any conflicts within their group wisely.

iv)

Independent
Students were able to washed their own clothes, boiled and frying eggs,
completed own tasks given by the team leader and rowed a raft individually.

v)

Critical thinking
Students able to channel out their creative ideas, think critically and logically in
all group tasks such as think on how to build a raft using bottles and how to
float a brick that sank in the lake.

Interviews with the students found that they were being forced to go for the camping at the
first place but it turned to become a very exciting experience they ever had.
I never wash my own clothes before and all the while mom used
washing machine to wash our familys clothesbut when there was
no electricity, we all do not know what to do with all the dirty

clothes. I will wash my own uniforms after this as it is not that

difficult and good to strengthen my arms. Student 1
I will help mother to cook after this as it is easy like abcIm glad
that I learnt the right technique to prepare basic foods like boiling
and frying eggs making steamed fish, and also cooking
vegetables.. Student 2
I didnt like physical activities. My only hobby was playing games
with my I-pad, and I was so addicted with facebook. I cant leave
without it. I was at first worried that I will miss my I-pad during the
camping but very unexpectedly I didnt remember about it at all. The
challenge of building and rowing a raft made me feel sooo excited
and it was sooo fun. It thought me being independent and I feel very
adventurous. I dont feel like going home this early as I already
created the bonds with the environment and friends. - Student 3
It was cleared that from the interviews, students learned new things in life that
benefit them in terms of social, thinking and independent skills. However, the observations
also showed that during the camping program, students were hard to follow instructions
from the camp commandant and other advisers. From our research through the feedback
form, this was due to the reason that before the camping program, they were very attached
to gadgets like smart phones and tablets that made their interactions and communications
with others become limited.

CONCLUSION
Organized camping activities can turn students to be holistic. This is because students
learned specific skills that combined all domains; cognitive, affective, psychomotor and
social. This camping program made students become manageable and discipline besides
educated them the do it yourself concept. Camping also could enhance their social

(communication and interaction), critical thinking, problems solving and survival skills.
These skills enhanced independent living skills among the children and develop students
growth. Furthermore, the camping program has left deep impacts in the students life
through various activities and challenges they had ever experienced.

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