Timbertop: History

The topic that we have been given for this assessment is a quite broad subject, because of this I am going to be narrowing this down to the ideas that Kurt Hahn and Sir James Darling brought forth to Geelong Grammar School Timbertop and how throughout the history of the Schools Campus the changes that have happened to the Outdoor and Experiential learning side. The thinking behind my decision to reduce the subject down to one single stream was to express my own op

Darling's vision of a bush extension school, unique in Australia at the time, was influenced by a number of factors. In the early 1950's, the horrors of the Second World War were over and there was a great sense of a new beginning, of wanting to rebuild a world that would never again be caught up in such devastation. Against this background of incipient social change, three specific influences were at work: the traditions of Geelong Grammar itself; the growth of the healthy mind-spirit-body- movement in the context of Australian education; and the impact on Darling of the philosophy of the German educationist, Dr. Kurt Hahn, Headmaster of Gordonstoun in Scotland.

Hahn developed what he called the Salem method of education, so called because it was developed at Salem, the famous school that he founded in 1920 on the shores of Lake Constance in Germany, in a castle provided by his patron, Price Max of Baden, the last Imperial Chancellor. The Salem method was an assignment-based approach whereby students were encouraged to take responsibility for their own studies and, ultimately, their individual destinies.

The philosophy with which Timbertop was created in 1951 remains its driving force. Sir James Darling, then the Headmaster of Geelong Grammar School and the founder of Timbertop, wrote

"The theory of Timbertop was this: that adolescent boys could develop by themselves, out of the usual school machine. Placed in a different and less clement environment, they should undertake responsibility for themselves and be given the challenges of something like a man's live under conditions that they had to conquer but the first principle was essentially one of self-reliance and the challenge to live up to this responsibility."

Today Timbertop is a coeducational school and over the last Fifty-five years things have changed significantly though the underlying emphasis of Timbertop has not. Timbertop offers students many new and unusual challenges; obstacles and hurdles, which resemble those that they will come across in their lives.

Focusing on the 7 laws of Salem and the changes that have undergone at Timbertop over its history.

1. Give children the opportunity for self-discovery.

From the very beginning the theory Darling had for Timbertop was "that adolescent boys could develop by themselves." Charlie Scudamore a past head of the campus once said

"The students see the journey (through the year at Timbertop) in physical terms and can be frightened of it. Once they become comfortable with the physical side, the journey becomes emotional and spiritual."

Whilst this quote only touches on the surface of self discovery it per

Darling's Concept of self reliance, service to the school and wider community, and spiritual awakening ment that boys co-operated with each other and worked side by side with builders, carpenters, contractors, teachers and local people. It ment discovering their innerselves by getting lost in the mountains, a spiritual as well as natural wilderness, and being resourceful enough to find their way back.

That Darling himself was not as confident about his educational leap in the dark as he sounded is revealed in his words to the first boys to go to Timbertop: "I want you yo understand that to set this up is a new venture for the school. The council has pledged 125,000 pounds. I'm asking you now - please don't let me down"

2. Make the children meet with triumph and defeat.

This is one of the basic principals that Timbertop has followed from the very beginning, through all of the challenges

3. Give the children the opportunity of self-effacement in the common cause.

4. Provide periods of silence.

5. Train the imagination.

6.Make games important but not predominant.

7. Free the sons of the wealthy and powerful from the enervating sense of privilege.

This the seventh and last law of Salem, it especially plays an important part in the schools workings. From the beginning of Timbertop you are forced to chop your own wood, to hike, even clean the school

But of course over the last 50 years things in some ways have improved but in others there has been a remarkable demise, with the addition of woman in 1974 to the school from my research I have been able to find that the whole outdoor course had to be modified to accommodate this inturn ended up to affect the hardships encountered both outdoors and whilst back at the campus. Still now days though there are signs of the original days left in the boys units, still no power in the sleeping quarters and no curtains. The outdoors program in the