If you are an early years setting operating from the likes of a church hall, leisure centre or scout hut, then it's likely that you have to share your outdoor space with other users.
Shared spaces can be a challenge, bringing with them common problems such as access, storage and conflicting priorities with other users, so careful planning is required. However, as long as you are willing to communicate and work effectively with everyone that uses the space, it is possible to create a usable, organised and interesting outdoor area that everyone, especially the children, can enjoy spending time in. And they do enable you to build relationships within your community and to increase your fundraising efforts.
Whatever your vision for your outdoor space, be sure to share your plans. Invite all the users of the building to an event, where you can make clear your intentions and explain how these will benefit the children, community and environment.
FREE FLOW
Unless the room you use opens directly onto your outdoor space, you will need to ensure that the children can enter and leave the building safely. If children need to negotiate stairs or corridors to get outside, this can eat into the amount of time they spend outdoors.
Allocate one practitioner as a 'float' to support children going outdoors and, if appropriate, allow older children to go outdoors in pairs. You could put up posters giving directions to remind the children of the route.
TIME SHARE
You may need to negotiate time slots for using the outdoors, which may require adapting daily routines, creating a rota and making sure there are enough staff available at these times.
Incorporate outdoor time into your planning, especially if you have a purpose-built covered area outdoors and find that you can be outdoors for most of the day.
ZONING
Children's outdoor time is often restricted due to groups sharing the space simultaneously, sometimes with children of different age ranges. If sharing makes it difficult to cater for every child's needs, create dedicated areas by adding temporary boundaries. Fencing that slots together, cones, planters or broom handles cemented into plant pots and linked by rope would all be suitable.
TOILETS
If toilets are shared or hard to access from outdoors, supervision can be problematic. If individual children need to go to the toilet, ask if any other children need to go at the same time to prevent constant trips in and out. If you can afford it, club together with other users to invest in a portable toilet or have outdoor toilets built within or near the outside area.
LANDOWNER
Having a lease or licence (an agreement between the owner/landlord and you the tenant) is essential as it will detail vital issues such as how much the rent is, when it is due, who is responsible for repairs, and which utilities are included.
If no lease is in place, approach the site owner and ask for one to be drawn up. If you want to make changes to the outdoors but are restricted by your existing lease, try to build a positive relationship with your landlord and explain the benefits of your proposed changes.
For further advice, talk to your local authority early years advisor, or if you are a member of the Pre-school Learning Alliance, contact your pre-school development worker.
MANAGING RESOURCES
Having resources well organised, stored and ready to use benefits staff and children and helps to maximise the use of your space.
In shared spaces, it may be unclear who is responsible for maintaining and putting away communal resources, and which budget is responsible for restocking them. If so:
- - Keep an inventory of each user's resources and do a stock check every month.
- - Create a checklist of how you find the room at the beginning of each session to help all groups remember how to leave it at the end.
- - Talk to the other groups about resource maintenance, such as sand for the sand pit, and whose budget the funds come from to maintain it.
- - Use a common room-hire agreement which outlines what each group is responsible for getting out, clearing away and how to report any damages.
- - Delegate a member of staff to be responsible for ensuring broken items are replaced and that the groups are sticking to the agreement.
STORAGE
To keep resources in good condition, you need appropriate outdoor storage. Note that resources of awkward shapes and sizes can prove difficult to store, retrieve and replace, and so are seldom used.
If other users require outside storage, ask if you can team up to share the costs and maintenance. Bear in mind that children should be able to access their own resources, so storage must be safe for them to do so.
If you are not allowed to have any outdoor storage, use trolleys and wheeled units to move equipment indoors and out. Although not an ideal solution, trolleys can help to create different zones outdoors.
If you can invest in a shed, research which type will best meet your needs. What size and shape will it need to be? Will it need to be maintained? Metal sheds, for example, may not be attractive, but are secure and fire-proof. Wooden sheds are more traditional and can double as a playhouse when empty of resources.
SECURITY
Consider how to protect your outdoor area against vandalism. Start by consulting the health and safety adviser at your local authority. Talk too to your local Community Police as they may have their own design advisor or architectural liaison officer, with good local knowledge and valuable advice on local community safety and site security.
Ginny Wright is an early years development officer for Learning through Landscapes
CASE STUDY
Cynthia Goulbourn started Ivy Tree Nursery from her home in 1986. As demand for places grew, the nursery was relocated to its present home at the United Reformed Church in Hampton Hill in 1988. It now rents the use of two rooms, one of which is upstairs.
As the outdoor space is at the front of the building, Cynthia is unable to offer free-flow. Instead, the children are taken downstairs and outside according to a rota. The nursery also has to contend with sharing the space with other groups, including a drama group and girl guides.
'Sharing a space can be very challenging,' explains Cynthia, 'especially when you are situated within a conservation area, as we are.'
The setting has experienced several difficult issues including not being allowed to have permanent fixtures outside and restrictions on the type of resources it can use - tyres are not allowed as they look 'untidy'.
For Cynthia, overcoming the issues raised by sharing the outdoors space has been about enthusing her staff and parents as to the value of outdoor learning and play for children.
'When we first moved into the premises, the garden was derelict. Although there are restrictions in our lease in relation to what we can do with the outdoor space, we were permitted to take over the running of it. The staff and children worked with one of the parents, a landscape gardener, reshaping the flower beds, digging in manure to improve the soil and planting up.
'Maintaining the grounds was difficult - in the winter the ground is very muddy and in the summer there was no-one on site who could cut the grass. The parents, however, raised £3,000 to put down some Astro turf and now the space requires little maintenance and can be used all year round.
'The conifer trees are used to create dens, and when the church was pruning a tree, we asked if they could leave a big bow behind which provides some shade.
'We don't have much in the way of outdoor resources because we don't have easily accessible storage - some simple boxes/bags of gardening tools, a variety of paint brushes, crayons, and natural resources like stones. Having less - and taking advantage of changes in the weather, for example, to introduce variety - means we can access our resources quickly and easily.'
FURTHER INFORMATION
'Creating a Space to Grow' by Gail Ryder-Richardson, David Fulton Publishers
PlayOut toolkit available from Learning through Landscapes, www.ltl.org.uk
Pre-school Learning Alliance, www.pre-school.org.uk
