Taking learning outdoors

A group of three girls are making ‘fruit salad’ with a collection of leaves, sticks, flowers, dirt and water in a saucepan.

Another group of children, donning a glittering array of mismatched dress-up costumes and accessories, are weaving in and out of the ‘fairy tale forest’ located among the leafy embankment and dry rock beds. A little girl, sporting safety goggles, is hammering nails into timber while three children nearby roll Matchbox cars down a makeshift ramp. This group of happy, bubbly children embody the pure joy and imagination of playing outdoors. It’s just a typical Friday in St Margaret’s Pre-Prep where, rain or shine, the four- and five-year-old girls and boys can be found learning in the natural environment surrounding their indoor classroom, developing positive relationships with the environment through their interactions with the natural world. According to Pre-Prep Teacher Belinda Knowles, engaging and enchanting students in the outdoors promotes many developmental benefits for the curious and adventurous little learners.

‘Time spent outdoors benefits children’s cognitive, social and physical development. Our Outdoor Classroom Day is play based and largely unstructured, which allows the children to spend long periods engrossed in outdoor play, all the while developing lifelong skills including social skills, creativity, resilience, problem solving and teamwork.

‘There are health and physical benefits, too. The children learn about making healthy and safe choices. We encourage bare feet to foster a connection with the natural environment, and, through this, they become aware of the environment, the leaves, rocks, mud, and sticks. It grounds them while also allowing them to strengthen their feet and leg muscles and stimulate their proprioceptors,’ Belinda says. ‘They employ the use of all of their senses to explore, too. They will look and listen to observe what is happening around them, touch what they can reach, smell the fresh scents of nature, and occasionally taste when given permission.’ A fundamental aspect of the outdoor classroom is developing students’ connection to the natural world and their environmental awareness to instil a lifelong sense of environmental stewardship.

Sustainable practices form part of the curriculum including a plastic bag and nude food recycling program, a worm farm, gardening, harvesting, cooking, and a real beehive setup in the garden. Food scraps are used in the worm farm, which is in turn utilised on the herb and vegetable garden beds that the children plant themselves. The Outdoor Classroom Day also provides opportunity for many incursions. Recently, for example, a beekeeper visited Pre-Prep to teach the students about bees and the beehive.

‘We were able to collect the natural honey from our beehive, strain it and then provide it to our Pre-Prep families,’ Belinda says. ‘Using nature to teach concepts such as, in this instance, science, is a highly effective way to engage students in learning while also promoting the need to show respect for environments. ‘We are also allowing them to connect with country and aim to embed the Aboriginal perspective that we are all the custodians of this land and need to look after it,’ Belinda says. While the intent of the program is to be unstructured to allow for longer periods of outdoor play and student-led learning, Belinda does take cues from the children, setting up activities based on their interests or as extensions to classroom learning during the week. ‘We make sure that the children have space to explore the intentional teaching that’s been done between Monday to Thursday. Our Outdoor Classroom is the day for them to embrace it and demonstrate what they have understood during the week. It’s really about facilitating them to have the space to represent their understanding and knowledge. ‘The mud kitchen, for example, provides an opportunity for the children to expand and apply their scientific and mathematical knowledge learnt during the week in cooking as they measure and pour. It also has cognitive benefits as they develop their problem solving, communication and teamwork skills and social benefits such as taking turns. In addition, they are developing their fine and gross motor skills with all of the mixing, measuring, pouring, carrying and adding of loose natural parts to their concoctions,’ Belinda says. ‘When we take the learning outside the classroom, we are able to engage and excite the children in different ways while also facilitating the development of literacy and numeracy skills. It increases creativity and provokes thinking outside the box. ‘We have been learning about transport and buildings and the measurement of these. Now the children are putting this into action, rolling cars down a makeshift ramp and measuring the distance with chalk. They are exploring their interests while also putting their knowledge of numeracy concepts into action.’ Just as outdoor play allows the children to apply their knowledge learnt during intentional teaching in the classroom, it can also steer the direction for intentional teaching. ‘We closely observe the children’s interests and inquiry so that we can build on their experiences and own observations outdoors back in the classroom with intentional teaching practices. It is an approach inspired by the Reggio Emilia philosophy that the classroom environment acts as the third teacher,’ Belinda says. The Outdoor Classroom Day is an integral facet of the Pre-Prep curriculum that focuses on nurturing the joy, connections and curiosity of our youngest minds while equipping them with the skills they need for life.

You can view the video of St Margaret’s Pre-Prep outdoor play by clicking the QR code.