To Raise up the Spirit of Communal Work through Outdoor
Education
Kardjono Kardjono
Faculty of Sport and Health Education, Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Jl. Dr. Setiabudhi No. 229, Bandung, Indonesia
Keywords: Physical Education, Outdoor Education, Communal Working, Hiking, Camping.
Abstract: Physical Education programs focus on the physical, social, mental, and emotional development such as
those found in Outdoor Education programs, might be implemented as a potential activity to raise up the
spirit of communal work. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of Physical Education
through Outdoor Education using hiking and camping program to raise up the spirit of communal work of
students. The subjects consisted of 40 male and female students from the secondary school. Subjects were
divided into two groups, an experimental and a control group. The experimental led through hiking and
camping program for 3 weeks, three times a week. The results showed that the experimental students
increased in communal work level compared to the control groups. From this research suggested any kind
of study can be improved in affective area through The Outdoor Education Program.
1 INTRODUCTION
Gotong royong (Communal Work) as the culture of
Indonesian society, is one of the unifying factors of
the nation's ethnic, religious and ethnic diversity
(Muthohir, 1998). Gotong royong, which is rich in
educational value, becomes in this tradition of
consecrated work the character of the nation, passed
down from generation to generation by our
predecessors. In line with the advances in science
and technology, the flow of globalization has
brought considerable influence, such as social
effectiveness, communication skills, team
cohesiveness and team work hence inevitably the
personality has been influenced by foreign cultures
that are more concerned with individualism (Neill,
1997a). Physical education activities in the outdoor
such as outdoor education programs, is expected to
revive the spirit of the fading mutual gotong royong
(Lutan, 1996).
Empirical evidence of the influence and position
of OE in physical education is still limited in
Indonesia. From the results of the study of Outdoor
Education, Neill (1997b) informed that "The
potential value of Outdoor Education for school
students is indicated by some studies which
demonstrate highly positive learning outcomes.”
According to Rickinson (2004) in the American
Institutes for Research (2005), research on learning
in the wild has been conducted between 1993 and
2003 and found that adventure programs in the wild
give positive results for young people,
environmental stance, independence, self-
confidence, self-esteem, controlling resources, self-
efficacy, personal effectiveness and coping
strategies and interpersonal skills and skills. Outdoor
Education on character education can be claimed to
be effective in fostering "life skills" and in the
context of physical education curricula, the OE that
emphasizes direct experience and experiential
learning seem to excel as "an innovative and holistic
approach to motion education, and as a tool for
developing social interaction and personal qualities
(Bucher, 1979).
Starting from that point, the problem to be
studied in this research is "How does the influence
of outdoor education work on the spirit of mutual
cooperation?" This question will be revealed from
the perspective of character education through
physical education.
444
Kardjono, K.
To Raise up the Spirit of Communal Work through Outdoor Education.
In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Sports Science, Health and Physical Education (ICSSHPE 2017) - Volume 2, pages 444-447
ISBN: 978-989-758-317-9
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved

2 METHODS
2.1 Subjects
The sample of the study was the junior high school
students, consisting of 40 male and female students.
The sample is divided into two similar numbered
groups, namely: experimental groups and control
groups of 20 students each. The experimental group
is the group that gained the experience of
experiencing the OE hiking and camping program,
and the control group is the group that did not get
OE activities.
2.2 Experimental Design
To know the effect of education in the wild through
the experience of hiking and camping, a gotong
royong / cooperation scale test is applied. The test is,
an initial test to determine the level of initial
cooperation, and the final test to know the results
after the intervention of the free education. For more
details, the design of the experiment in the form of a
chart is presented in figure 1.
Pre Exp. Post
Exp.
01 ------------------ 02
Exp. Variable
01 ----------------- 02
Cont. Variable
Figure 1: the design of the experiment in the form of a
chart.
2.3 Hiking and Camping Program
The research used an experimental method to trace
the effect of free variables, that is OE or open nature
education through hiking and camping program,
versus the spirit of gotong royong /communal work
student as a dependent variable. The experiment
lasted for three weeks, with the frequency of hiking
and camping three times per week.
2.4 Scale Test
The instrument of this research consists of the spirit
of gotong royong / cooperation with the construction
of the scale of Communal Mastery developed by
Hobfoll et al., (2007).
The learning outcomes of this research are the
spirit of mutual help/gotong-royong, that is how
much behavioral change is obtained in the
experimental group after 3 weeks of teaching
experience in the wild through the hiking and
camping program, will be revealed through the
implementation of Initial Test, Final Test.
2.5 Statistical Analysis
The result (t) test of both gain scores can illustrate
the acquisition of experiential results on which
statistical analysis is based. The sample data
collected from the preliminary Test results before
3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
To find out whether the free nature education
through hiking and camping programs affect the
spirit of mutual cooperation, data processing is held
based on raw scores obtained from the results of
initial tests and final tests of research.
The average calculation result, standard
deviation and variance of initial spirit and the final
spirit of gotong royong of control group and
experiment group can be seen in the following table
1 and table 2:
Table 1: The Average, Standard Deviation and Variance
of the Initial Spirit and The Final Spirit of Gotong Royong
of Control Group.
Period Test
Mean
Standard Deviation
Variance
Initial Test
25.2
1.077
1.221
Final Test
25.9
0.888
0.831
Table 2: The Average, Standard Deviation and Variance
of the Initial Spirit and The Final Spirit of Gotong Royong
of Experiment Group.
Period Test
Mean
Standard Deviation
Variance
Initial Test
27.15
1.492
2.345
Final Test
32.6
1.772
3.305
To test the research hypothesis, whether the free
nature education with experience of hiking and
camping, positively affect the students’ spirit of
mutual work?, the results of processing and analysis
of data that have been obtained are utilized as
follows table 3:
Table 3: The t-Test Results of Mean Gain Scores the
Control Group and The Experiment Group.
Mean Gain
Scores of
Control Group
Mean Gain
Scores of
Experiment group
t-
calculate
conclusion
0.7
5.45
3.59
Significant
t 0.05 = 1.684
To Raise up the Spirit of Communal Work through Outdoor Education
445

The average gain score calculation results of the
spirit of gotong royong, obtained from the Scores of
Initial Test and Final Test in the control group and
experimental group each are 0.7 and 5.45. These t
test results showed that t arithmetic 3.59 was larger
than t-table (1.684) on the degree of confidence (p
<0.05).
The difference indicates that the experimental
group has a higher level of gotong royong spirit than
the control group’s spirit of mutual cooperation,
which can be interpreted that the research hypothesis
is supported by empirical facts. Thus, there are
indications that education in the wild through hiking
and camping programs leads to changes in the spirit
of mutual cooperation among junior high school
students.
Different from urban life encourages students to
feel each other's care and need of each other as an
expression of mutual cooperation. Journey together,
eat together, play together, sleep in a group that can
strengthen unity among the students.
The results of this study support the opinion of
Rickinson (2004) in the American Institutes for
Research (2005); research on learning in the wild
has been conducted between 1993-2003 and found
that adventure programs in the wild give positive
results to young people, including attitudes toward
the environment, independence, confidence, self-
esteem, sources of control, self-efficacy, personal
effectiveness and coping strategies and interpersonal
skills and social skills, such as social effectiveness,
communication skills, group cohesion and
teamwork.
According to Priest et al. (1997), education in
the outdoors creates events that place students in
difficult circumstances which they must solve. The
decisions they make directly and quickly will
usually affect them quickly as well. These
characteristics make educational programs in the
wild as the most likely activity to provide
meaningful learning experiences, especially in
generating a spirit of cooperation.
4 CONCLUSIONS
Education in outdoor gives great influence to the
students to gain experience, and to reflect on it
(Neill, 1997c). Diverse outdoor activities, including
walking on rice fields, vegetable fields, up and down
hills, crossing rivers, exploring caves and camping
activities create challenging and exciting events.
These naturally occurring circumstances place
students in difficult circumstances, that they have to
solve and decide together. Togetherness in said
activity creates learning experiences to arouse the
spirit of cooperation among the students.
Based on data analysis about the influence of
Outdoor Education with Hiking and Camping
experience on the spirit of gotong royong during 9
times meetings, the following conclusion is
obtained:
There is a strong indication that Outdoor
Education with Hiking and Camping experience has
a positive effect on generating the spirit of Gotong
Royong among junior high school students.
Based on the results of this study, the researcher
conveyed suggestions that are expected to contribute
and considered by the experts of education and
further researchers, namely:
 In order to complete the educational
philosophy especially in the development of
affective domains, Outdoor Education should
be part of the curriculum at all levels of
education, because it contains unique and
complete value in the context of a
comprehensive education;
 Outdoor Education with Hiking and Camping
experience should be popularized for all the
people of Indonesia, in addition to recreational
and relaxation facilities, as well as a means of
friendship with nature, so as to generate a
sense of love and activity in preserving nature;
 To maximize the results of research, it
requires a deeper emphasis, especially in the
process of contemplation, so that the direct
coaching and development of spiritual
dimension is an integral part of the
educational process.
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