FEATURE: OUTDOOR LEARNING


should be offered as part of a long-term programme spanning the four seasons – and not reserved only for a few sunny afternoons at the end of the school year! The cold and wet weather has a lot to offer too and will begin to develop some very basic survival skills, as well as an appreciation for the different seasons and why each has its place in nature. But outdoor education also nurtures a much wider range of skills, because children are tasked with such different challenges than would be available within the Pre-Prep or Prep classroom setting.


The nature effect “Benefits like these have led to outdoor learning being termed ‘the nature effect’. Contrary to many teachers’ reluctance to hold lessons outdoors because of concerns that children might end up over-excited and unable to concentrate on their schoolwork when back in the classroom, recent research has indicated that the opposite is in fact true. Research conducted by Professor Ming Kuo at the Human-Environment Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois reveals that outdoor learning has a positive impact not only on children’s learning while out of doors, but on their learning once they are back in the classroom, too. An ipaper article explains that children “are much more interested and attentive, allowing teachers to instruct uninterrupted for almost twice as long during subsequent indoor schoolwork” following an hour of outdoor learning, compared to pupils who had the same hour’s learning indoors.


Gresham’s Outdoor Wild Learning School (OWLS) “We have been delighting in the benefits of the great outdoors for decades, set as we are in 200 acres and enviably located between the award- winning coast and countryside of north Norfolk, in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. But we wanted to develop an outdoor learning programme that is tailored to suit our own pupils, in our own back garden and so from September 2017 all pupils in Nursery to Year 4 have been participating in OWLS sessions, gaining an appreciation of the great outdoors and a deeper understanding of theoretical concepts they have learned in the classroom, and much more besides. Most groups have an hour and a half long OWLS session each week and the grounds, as well as the nearby beaches and nature reserve, are fantastic sites for investigations, creations, campfires, discoveries and going ‘off on tangents’. The best part of running our own programme is having both the flexibility to incorporate our fantastic wider surroundings and the holistic view to determine the best activities to


do with each group throughout their five years in our OWLS programme – building up from early adventures to greater expeditions. “We have lesson plans, of course, but the


structure of lessons is much more fluid. We want to engender a real passion for being outdoors, as well as an idea that learning can be unstructured, enquiry-led, and fun! So, as long as the sessions have ‘scaffolding’ to support learning and facilitators who are experienced in knowing which tangents to follow, then learning outcomes are met and surpassed! But the children feel like they are leading their own learning, are doing what they choose and enjoy, and are being encouraged to go off and discover things for themselves. “Earlier this month we welcomed parents of


current OWLS pupils to try out the outdoor learning experience at our official OWLS launch. We unveiled the new facilities in our grounds – including an open sided wooden classroom (pupils do have some shelter from the elements when necessary!) and spaces for campfires and creations and performances. Attendees enjoyed chatting around a campfire, constructing a model Saxon village, and creating an enormous sculpture of an owl – an owl being both our outdoor learning mascot and the Holt town mascot. “Parents appreciated being able to experience


this different way of working, or structuring learning, which encourages children to think of learning as an ongoing process rather than as something that is limited to when they are in a classroom. If a child spots something in the


woods, the lesson can be adapted to reinforce positive behaviours in which children are thinking beyond the usual parameters of classroom learning. This seems quite natural to adults: when we converse and have our most interesting and enlightening interactions with others it’s often because our co-conversers are interested in the topic of discussion and are interesting contributors, and we feed off each other and take the conversation off on fascinating tangents. The same is true for children but the more formal classroom setting can inhibit this type of interaction from occurring. “What’s more, rather than reinforcing a


classroom notion that subjects are separate entities, to be learnt and understood in silos, outdoor learning develops an interdisciplinary approach to development through providing opportunities to pursue learning under one theme that would often come under different disciplines in formal learning settings. For us, the proof of our outdoor learning


programme is in the pudding. Pupils from Nursery to Year 4 tell us frequently how much they have loved their latest OWLS session; they gain real confidence in taking on the new challenges as the weeks progress; and they surpass themselves frequently in their learning outcomes. “Clearly we are advocates of outdoor learning,


but not just because it is the latest educational trend! We are firm believers that we should not be moulding children to try to make them suit the education system; we should be moulding the education system to fit the way children learn best.”


May 2018


www.education-today.co.uk 27


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