Early years practitioners are recognising more and more the benefits that being outdoors can bring to a child's intellectual, physical and emotional well-being, and creating lively and dynamic outdoor areas.
One example is Acorns Montessori Nursery in Camblesforth, North Yorkshire, where children are given daily opportunities to play outdoors. The quality of the outdoor provision is one reason why parents choose the setting for their children.
The nursery has built on this through being a pilot setting for Learning Through Landscape's Growing Upwards project for early years provision.
Growing Upwards, funded by the DfES as part of the Growing Schools Initiative, seeks to identify and demonstrate the rich benefits of a growing theme for young children.
Children come to the nursery knowing that they will spend plenty of time outside each day, and wear clothes that give them the freedom to explore.
The nursery has an area where the children can change into their outdoor clothing and has just installed an outdoor sink, where the children can wash their hands after 'working' at planting and tending the nursery's flower and vegetable gardens.
A second sink is positioned near the vegetable plot so that children can water all the vegetables, fruit and flowers around the outdoor space. The children know that watering is their responsibility and they deal with it enthusiastically every session.
The children also keep chickens, quails and guinea pigs. They have even raised two lambs that came on loan from a farming parent.
Every day they check on their guinea pigs and collect the eggs, which are used later in baking or given to them to take home to their families.
The lambs occupy a converted brick shed and share a small, enclosed grassy area with the other animals. The shed houses the guinea pigs over the winter so that children can continue to hold and tend to them.
From a viewing platform, the children can watch the animals as they run free, and there they see the garden from a totally different perspective.
The children spend long periods there while they enjoy the feeling of being high up and looking down at other children at play.
To encourage the children to reflect and converse, the nursery has provided a pair of small benches, which face each other, and a beautiful casa del bambini, that acts as a central meeting place, where children and adults can sit together and talk.
A successful - and cheap - tent has been created using a curtain, which is attached to the fence by its upper loops and pegged to the ground through eyelets inserted along the lower hem. Nursery staff place an object under the curtain each day as a stimulus for the children's play and the children add other items as their ideas develop.
Another inexpensive and novel feature is the climbing frame - a row of car and tractor tyres half buried in the ground. This provides different textures to feel and interesting spaces for the children to play in.
Observers have noticed that the physical skills and imaginative play used on this structure were far more highly developed than those usually seen in children playing on an average fixed climbing frame.
The new sand pit, which is large enough for several children to sit and play in, is made very simply and it is proving especially popular.
To increase access and use of the garden, Acorns have laid pathways wide enough for wheelchairs. The next phase of their project is to invite some local schoolchildren with special needs to play in their garden and meet their animals, while the Acorns children act as hosts, guides and experts.
These paths have changed the way the children move around the garden, as they provide better links between the various features. Children can move from the climbing tyres to the vegetable plot, via the herb island to rest and chat at casa del bambini before making a call on the animals.
Not just the children, but adults at Acorns enjoy the outdoors and appreciate its value. They convey that appreciation to the children, who love being in the special and favourite place that is their outdoor area.
WHAT BEING OUTDOORS DOES FOR CHILDREN
A well-resourced and well-supported outdoor area can bring many benefits to a young child's development. Outdoor play fosters children's:
* awareness of their environment
* emotional well-being, particularly when there are areas with greenery and water, places to feel alone and reflect, and time for self-initiated play
* good behaviour, particularly when the outdoor area is developed for the children (not the adults) and valued by practitioners
* self-confidence, as children learn to judge their physical limits and persevere in new challenges
* self-esteem, when children are given responsibility for maintaining part of the garden
* friendships with other children and adults
* ability to relax and converse. It is important for adults and children to spend relaxed, unstructured time together to sit and chat. A relaxed child is more likely to engage in conversation.
* physical skills, health and intellectual ability, when they have the space - and permission - to move freely, be active and be noisy. Young children learn by moving and doing (kinaesthetic learning) and make sense of their world through all their senses - brain and body development are inextricably linked.
* curiosity and fascination when the opportunities offered respond to children's strong exploratory drive
* sense of awe and wonder, by providing a crucial sense of connecting with nature. The theory of multiple intelligences now includes 'naturalistic intelligence', something worth cultivating in every person.
* cross-curricular learning, as the outdoors provides a meaningful and stimulating learning environment
* abilities to problem-solve, negotiate, compromise and collaborate during structured and unstructured play
* ability to recognise, assess and handle risk and so keep themselves safe, yet not be afraid to try new challenges and cope with any unforeseen consequences.
