Outdoor Learning: A Teacher's Starting Point

Written for someone who has decided to try this and now has to actually do it on a Tuesday with a class and no budget.

Before you go outside

Persuading a Principal to Allow Outdoor Learning is first, because most attempts stop here. Ask for something small and specific, and bring the risk note unprompted.

Then How to Start a School Garden With No Budget. Start with four containers, not a bed.

The first month

Your First Ten Minutes Outdoors is the single highest value page here. The routine does the work, not the activity.

One Adult, Twenty Five Children, Outdoors covers boundaries, signals, stations and head counts.

Keeping Children Safe Outdoors is the real risk list, where heat is the concern and snakes are not.

Making it survive

Making a School Garden Survive the Holidays. Almost every school garden dies in a break.

Tools and Materials That Survive the Tropics. Budget for replacement or spend the money twice.

When the Plant Dies. It will. Plant two per child.

Making it count

Recording and Assessing Outdoor Learning. Outdoor learning gets cut because it cannot be evidenced. Every session should produce one artefact.

Getting Parents On Board. Show the maths, not the philosophy.

Teaching better once you are out there

How to Ask a Child a Good Question Outdoors. Wait eight seconds. It will feel much longer than it is.

Teaching Three Age Groups at Once. Change the question, not the activity.

Specific things to run

Running a Classroom Rice Tray carries a whole term on one table.

Raising Butterflies in a Classroom is the one children remember for years.

Composting in a Tropical Climate works faster here than anywhere, and fails faster too.

A Mud Kitchen That Does Not Become Chaos. Finite water is the whole trick.

And the sheets themselves

Two hundred and twenty four printable worksheets, ages zero to fourteen, sit in the worksheet collection. Every one of them was written for a real classroom rather than a textbook.