I run small therapist led adventure groups in nature on the Sunshine Coast, currently capped at four participants while I am the only facilitator. Groups are for young people aged 10 to 25, and I also offer individual sessions across the same age range.
I am an Occupational Therapist with Mental Health Endorsement and over 16 years in adolescent and young adult mental health. Most of the young people I work with are neurodiverse (autistic, ADHD, or both).
Groups run in age bands, so your young person is with others at a similar stage rather than in a wide mixed age group. Each band works towards a bigger adventure of two to four hours that the group chooses together. The shorter sessions leading up to it teach the skills that adventure will need.
Skills practised in sessions: planning and packing, finding your way with a map and without one, solving a problem alongside other people, staying with a task when it gets frustrating, and noticing what your body is doing (hot, tight, restless, shaky) before it takes over.
Basic bushcraft and survival skills are a part of this, though what matters most is that we find adventure based activities the group is actually interested in. The survival side is mostly about knowing how to look after yourself outdoors: what to do if you get separated from the group or lost (stop walking, stay visible, use your whistle, wait to be found), building a simple shelter, tying knots that hold, reading the weather and the terrain, snake safety, and packing so you have what you need for the day.
The starting point is interest. When a young person is doing something they genuinely want to do, the harder parts of it tend to feel less like a challenge and more like part of the activity, whether that is walking further than expected to reach a lookout, staying with a knot that won’t tie, sorting out a difference of opinion with someone in the group, or sitting with one that does not get resolved. Those moments are often where the useful learning sits.
Nothing here is compulsory. Young people choose which adventures they take on, and they can stop, sit out, or change their mind at any point without needing to explain why. Sessions are set at what the young person can already do comfortably, or just past it if they are up for that, and I adjust during the session if it turns out to be too much or too easy.
The aim is for these skills to get used outside of sessions as well, at home, at school, at work, or with friends. Success may look small at first, and parents often notice it before it gets talked about, like your young person packing their own bag or staying calmer when a plan changes.
Sessions run on public tracks and reserves close to town. Activities currently include bushwalking, natural navigation, tracking, shelter and cordage.
Getting started: every young person begins with an individual session with a parent or carer present, to work out what they actually want to get better at and whether a group is the right fit. That session is charged at the standard individual rate.
Support workers are welcome to attend with a participant. Please get in touch beforehand so the session can be planned around it.
AHPRA registration [OCC0001746519]