Outdoor Education

Designing outdoor play spaces is often approached as an adult-led task. When we as educators collaborate directly with children, outdoor spaces become more meaningful, engaging, and reflective of how students use them every day.

Young children are naturally curious and often explore and use their outdoor spaces in ways we as adults do not expect. They view the world in a different light, finding possibility and discovery in ways adults may not have considered or noticed.  By involving children of every age in the design of their outdoor environment, we gain valuable insight into what piques their interest and imagination, and we empower them to make decisions that affect them.

What Does Collaboration Look Like with Young Children?

1. Observe. Take time to notice before making a change.  How are children currently using their outdoor spaces? What are the traffic patterns?  What areas as empty?  Which is loud?  Which are quiet?  The children’s level of engagement is a strong indicator of what is working and what may be missing.
2. Ask Questions. Invite children into the conversation by asking questions to help you dig deeper and to allow them time to reflect on their own play habits: “What do you wish we had outside?” and “What would make our space more fun?” “Where do you like to go when you want to be alone?” and “Who do you play with in this spot?”  Responses may be imaginative and outside the box, but they can serve as inspiration for realistic design elements.
3. Draw and Prototype. Encourage children to draw their ideal playspace or create a model using loose parts and recycled materials to help the group visualize potential plans. This process helps both educators and students bring concepts to life.  Prototypes also allow ideas to become iterative and collaborative.  How can a drawing be altered?  What can be added or moved around on the prototype?
4. Support Children’s Empowerment. The deciding voice in the final design choices should be the children’s—materials, themes, placement, and features. This gives the community of children a sense of ownership.  By delegating to them the power to decide, children learn to be active agents in their education and begin practicing successful ways to participate, share their opinions, and act upon them.

This process requires educators to be open and willing to let go of the idea of what a playground should look like or be. The goal is to create a flexible environment that has the ability to change with the children’s interests. Our goal as educators is to ensure that the children’s voices are heard and that they have a space that is truly their own—enriching, meaningful, and engaging.
 
Danielle Doyle and Linda Rothman
Teachers at Shirlee Green Preschool, St. Louis, MO

To say that this year was exhausting, and challenging is an understatement.  Last year at this time we were all anxiously wondering if schools would open and would it be possible to balance COVID regulations with best practices for our children.  Somehow amidst cleaning, sanitizing, and socially distancing students we did it!

Now as summer begins, we are reflecting and evaluating what we want to keep from the past year.  What are our “COVID Keepers”? We have adopted this phrase from the workshop, Trauma in our Brains and our Bodies with Betsy Stone at the virtual ECE-RJ conference in March. 

We have decided that being outdoors as much as possible is our number one COVID Keeper.

As a school, we made the decision to spend as much time outside as possible.  We are lucky to have a large, beautiful playground surrounded by a wooded area with a little stream.  This year we had four classrooms.  The playground was divided into four sections, and classes rotated to each section over the week.  Carts were used to carry materials; individual art kits for each student and mats/trays for snack/lunch and other activities were purchased for students.  It was a lot of work at first.  Both students and teachers adapted to our new routines.  Materials and activities that were traditionally used inside pre-pandemic were brought outside.  Thinking out of the box became our daily practice.

The outside became a natural sensory bin.  Digging for worms, playing in the sandbox and mud kitchen, climbing on small trees, and taking walks through the woods.  I would ask my students to use their senses to stop and listen, to see and to smell in the woods.  Each time it rained or snowed we observed the flow and water level of the stream.  Did I mention that we are in Massachusetts and went outside every day for much of the day even when the temperatures were 20 degrees and snowing?

The first severe weather day that we could not go outside was hard for both students and teachers.  We could only have two students per table or rug area.  It was difficult to see the students playing in each area alone.  We had multiple timers going for turns with preferred toys.  On the other hand, it was a natural way to teach taking turns and patience.  Many times, the students would negotiate with each other on who’s turn would be next.

Don’t get me wrong there were challenges.  Circle time outside was often difficult.  There were too many distractions for some students.  Overall, we plan to continue spending most of the day outside.  Personally, my mindset for the past year has adapted to focus on what is possible to do and how to do it in a different way versus focusing on what is not possible.  This shift in thinking has made a huge difference in adjusting my teaching practices for the better. 

 Mazel Tov to the educators during this pandemic!  We did it!

Stacey Gabriel
Teacher- Temple Beth Avodah
Newton MA

July/August 2021

As I reflect on this year, I am surprised to have learned that the pandemic provided a blessing in disguise for our Temple Shir Tikva Early Learning Center community. 

 Imagine beginning your first job as a preschool director with the world in lockdown. My dreams of creative classroom communities gave way to safety and sanitizing. Instead of focusing on emergent curriculum, social-emotional learning, moral education, and social democracy, I focused on restrictions, rules, protocols, and procedures.

 I wondered how we would overcome the obstacles presented by Covid. What I found is that the combination of creative teachers, imaginative children, natural materials, and outdoor spaces helped us turn obstacles into opportunities.

 As a Reggio-Inspired program, we refer to the classroom environment, both indoors and outdoors, as the 3^rd teacher, with teachers and parents as the first and second teachers. Thus, the intentional ways in which the teachers prepare the classroom environment promote relationships, communication, collaboration, and exploration through play.

 If Covid had not forced us to “take the inside outside,” as a very wise 4-year-old phrased it, the classrooms might look as they always had, with dress up and sensory tables, with shared materials and food. Maybe we wouldn’t have spent as much time outside and I am convinced that while the curriculum would still have been wonderful, it would not have been as magical.

 The children ventured into our “outdoor classrooms” for everything from art projects to lunch to large architectural work with logs and sticks. They created habitats for animals, and used twigs, leaves and acorns to make “food.”  They hunted for tracks and bear caves. They used the natural materials they collected, and the beauty of our outdoor classrooms, to dive deeply into their curiosities and find wonder in their world. With one class, this led to a deeper study of the Grand Teton Mountain range.

 Nature inspired the children and their learning, and they were able to spend long amounts of time on a topic. Some investigations (like the one about animals that inhabit the Grand Tetons) lasted for several months. 

 The children might remember the months at home, but I think, more than anything else, they will remember coming to school and learning about bison at the Grand Tetons. One day, maybe they will want to go there to experience it for themselves.

Before the school year started, I wondered, would we be able to create rich and meaningful curriculum for/with the children, while also maintaining health and safety guidelines? I very quickly found out that the answer was yes.  We brought the inside outside and the fact that the children shaped their own learning -- that's the true blessing of this year.

Stephanie Lerner
Early Learning Center Director
Temple Shir Tikva, Wayland MA