The Importance of the Physical Escape
How breaking out of our daily spaces helps us learn
Somehow as rejuvenating and rewarding as taking a long weekend can be, it also means I typically spend the shortened preceding week in a hurried rush to meet goals and deadlines so that I can truly disconnect when the time comes.
This was the case on a recent summer weekend as I sat extra-concentrated at my computer trying to type out some last minute emails before heading out for a long-weekend of camping. Feeling a bit stressed, as I often do, that I hadn’t accomplished as much as I wanted to, I headed out with my two cousins and uncle to Dausenau in Rheinland-Pfalz, a little town settled on the Lahn river.
Fast forward to about an hour after arriving, sitting in the sun after a swim in the river when my cousin, who had also barely managed to eke out a deadline before setting off, turned to me and remarked on the amazing difference a couple can hours can make for your stress levels.
Of course, it was more likely the change of location that had brought on this sun-soaked state of relaxation. By physically escaping to-do lists and laptops and even a place to charge our cell phones, our brains were set free to settle back.
This importance of physical escape doesn’t just apply to vacation.
Where we learn is an important and perhaps often-overlooked consideration.
My host institute, the Arbeitskreis deutscher Bildungsstätten (Association of German Educational Organizations), is a nationwide umbrella organization for 105 non-formal education centers (i.e. not schools) that promote politische Bildung (civic learning). Many members have their own Bildungshäuser (education houses) equipped with overnight accommodation, recreation and dining facilities and of course, seminar spaces. Although some single-day opportunities are offered, many of the experiences on offer encourage participants to come to live and learn for multiple days at these special places of encounter and learning.
If this sounds foreign to you, it’s because it likely is. Although these educational institutions featuring overnight accommodation are relatively commonplace in Germany, they aren’t in the U.S. You may think “but wait, haven’t you heard of summer camp before?!?”. The idea is different. Although summer camps in the U.S. may contribute to the development of important civic skills like communication and critical thinking, the focus is placed more on recreation and informal education than on non-formal learning, and the vast majority do not purport a civic or political focus.
In her article, “Cooperation between Schools and Non-formal Education: Goals, Challenges, and a Practical Example” (translated), Christine Reich describes how it is an escape of the time and space of everyday life that distinguishes such youth education centers/houses (2017, p. 155). The physical break from everyday life is not an attempt to sever the everyday experiences of participants from civic learning, but rather to open up new horizons of experience and seek to integrate them with participants’ realities (Reich, 2017, p. 154).
Although a traditional feature in the German non-formal political education scene, these more traditional “education houses” have dwindled in recent years, as an increase in other places of non-school learning in Germany’s pluralistic civic education landscape have increased. Museums, education escape rooms, even soccer stadiums are giving young people the opportunity to develop their civic competence in innovative ways.
What all these have in common is that they don’t occur in a school classroom. While school has an important role to play in developing effective democratic citizens, it is certainly not the only space.
Museums, youth clubs, summer camps, historical sites, libraries, are just a few examples of spaces that should focus on how they can make civic and political learning a priority outcome, not a byproduct.
Naturally physical space and an escape from our everyday lives is not the only important characteristic that makes außerschulische Bildung (non-formal education) an impactful model of learning, and non-formal learning can and does take place in the absence of this physical escape. The importance of self-directed learning, absence of formalized standards and the testing and ranking that accompanies them, participation in the development and delivery of learning opportunities, and voluntary participation are also critical components that help define non-formal education (außerschulische Bildung).
However, the importance of physical space shouldn’t be underestimated.
As I’ve participated in online events that have completely replaced analogue plans I had made as part of my fellowship, one common frustration from fellow participants has been the inability to step back from a long list of other to-dos. When we pack our suitcases and fly off to in-person trainings or conferences in other cities or countries, work and life demands dim, but when break time comes at an online conference, we simply have to open up our emails to see a flood of emails that need tending or walk into the kitchen to see dishes piling up.
Human beings thrive on novelty and new experiences (Dean, 2019), which is one of the reasons our shelter-in-place lifestyles have led to, at best a feeling of restlessness and “quarantine fatigue” and, worse, increasing rates of depression and anxiety (Fowers and Wan, 2020). And with all the innovative thinking that has arisen as a result of the pandemic, the ability to physically leave our surroundings is something online opportunities simply can’t replicate.
The shock of Covid-19 has sparked many of us to rethink how we live our lives, what we value, and how we want to move forward.
As we take stock, let’s not forget the value that a change of scenery can have on all aspects of our lives, but especially for learning.
Reich, Christine. “Kooperation Zwischen Schulischer Und Ausserschulischer Bildung: Ziele, Herausforderungen, Praxisbeispiel.” Was Politische Bildung Alles Sein Kann Einführung in Die Politische Bildung, by Thomas Gill and Sabine Achour, Wochenschau Verlag, 2017, pp. 153–160.
Dean, Nicole. “The Importance of Novelty “ Brain World.” Brain World, 5 Sept. 2019, brainworldmagazine.com/the-importance-of-novelty/.
Fowers, Alyssa, and William Wan. “A Third of Americans Now Show Signs of Clinical Anxiety or Depression, Census Bureau Finds amid Coronavirus Pandemic.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 26 May 2020, www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/05/26/americans-with-depression-anxiety-pandemic/?arc404=true&itid=lk_inline_manual_36.
