Festivals in Vietnam as a learning context for school trips

Festivals in Vietnam are often introduced as cultural highlights — moments of celebration, performance, and tradition. For school trips, they can appear as optional additions to an itinerary.

In practice, they offer something different. Unlike most structured activities, festivals are not designed for students. They unfold on their own terms, with their own pace, logic, and meaning.

This makes them one of the most challenging — and potentially valuable — contexts within experiential learning.

Entering a system that is already in motion

Festivals such as Tet or the Whale Festival are not events that can be explained fully in advance.

Students step into environments where large groups of people are already participating in shared rituals. Movement, timing, and behaviour follow patterns that are not immediately visible to an outsider.

There is no clear “start” for students. They join something that is already happening.

This requires a different kind of engagement — observing before acting, adjusting behaviour, and recognising that they are not the center of the experience.

Cultural expression in public space

Festivals like the Lim Festival or Hue Festival bring cultural practices into public view.

Music, performance, and ceremony are not presented as staged shows, but as part of a living tradition. Students encounter culture as something that is performed, repeated, and shared within a community.

Understanding does not come from explanation alone. It comes from seeing how meaning is carried through these forms over time.

Unpredictability and group dynamics

Other festivals, such as cow racing in An Giang or lantern nights in Hoi An, introduce a different dynamic.

These environments are less controlled. Crowds shift, timing changes, and attention is pulled in multiple directions. For student groups, this creates both opportunity and risk.

From an operational perspective, these are some of the most demanding contexts to manage. Movement, safety, and group cohesion require constant attention.

At the same time, these situations reveal how students respond when structure is limited — how they navigate uncertainty, how they stay oriented, and how they engage without clear instruction.

Why festivals matter in experiential learning

What distinguishes festivals from other parts of a school trip is that they are not designed for learning outcomes.

They are designed for something else — celebration, remembrance, belief.

Students are entering a space where meaning already exists, rather than being constructed for them. This changes the nature of the experience.

Instead of asking “what are we supposed to learn here?”, the question becomes:

• what is happening?

• how do people participate?

• where do we fit within this?

Designing around what cannot be controlled

Including festivals in a program is not always straightforward.

They require alignment with timing, tolerance for unpredictability, and careful consideration of safety and group management. Not every festival is suitable for every group.

But when they are included thoughtfully, they create moments that cannot be replicated in more controlled settings.

They expose students to systems of meaning that are lived, not explained.

What students take away

Festivals are not always the most comfortable part of a trip. They can be crowded, confusing, and at times overwhelming.

But they are often the moments where students become most aware of themselves in relation to others — how they observe, how they respond, and how they adjust.

In that sense, festivals do not simply add cultural color to a program. They introduce a different layer of experience — one that challenges students to engage with something that is not designed around them.

And that is precisely where their value lies.