This term, our children at Hungerford nursery school will have regular access to acres of woodland, marking the latest development in the school's efforts to provide the children with greater challenge, freedom and control over their outdoor learning.
Our staff had always monitored the outdoor provision but embarked on a review when, due to building work, we had to move to temporary premises with a smaller outdoor area.
When your outdoor area is busy and all the children are occupied, you don't think that you've got too much. But what we found was that we were overequipped. Like so many people, we'd felt that we had to provide for all the curriculum areas outdoors. It was still a good experience for the children but it was one that we, the adults, were delivering. So, it wasn't promoting the children's independence and autonomy, it wasn't letting the children's creativity flow and it wasn't letting them develop things in the way that they wanted to.
Taking the risk
How to pass that control to children became evident when one of our teachers and two teaching assistants visited a nursery in Norway, through the Teachers' International Professional Development programme.
They couldn't believe that the Norwegian children were working with knives and making fires in the woods and were given so much freedom. Staff interacted with the children only when they needed help.
On my own, later, visit to a Norwegian nursery, I was impressed by:
- the extent to which playing in the woods, in particular climbing trees, offered children challenge and helped upper body strength
- the logical progression of woodland activities for children from age three
- the children's ability to assess risk
- the extent to which the older children acted as role models for the younger ones.
Open air
Back on our old site but in a brand new building, we drew on their recent experiences when we:
- introduced 'fresh-air Fridays', when children spend the whole day outside, come rain or shine
- scaled down the resources on offer and planned the outdoor area around a central large climbing frame, a huge sand pit, zones for bike and ball play and a series of bays for construction and role play
- introduced more challenge and opportunities to build upper body strength through a large climbing frame resting on a high-density surface and activities such as digging in the huge sand pit.
Essentially, we have decluttered. Now we provide the resources that the children want. If you start with their learning and their imagination and help them to move that on, it inspires them to take their learning to another level. Now we give the children the respect to choose what they want to do and how.
We recognised we weren't offering opportunities to develop upper body strength, so there's now much more challenge than before. Building upper body strength is vital to developing balance, co-ordination and confidence, as well as the fine motor skills and hand-eye co-ordination essential for reading and writing.
We get children who haven't been challenged physically, so we are conscious of risk, but we don't have accidents - children won't try something until they're ready. Our trip to Norway made us realise that.
By taking this approach, we do not have an issue with boys' and girls' learning. The children's personal and social development is always pretty high and their language for communication and thinking is always good. Their team-working, negotiating and shared thinking have also improved.
Down in the woods
Now staff are developing a forest school in woodland owned by one of the school governors. Last term, a forest school consultant worked with the children over six sessions, one of the teachers completed forest school training and the children were able to visit the woods at least once. This term we are planning weekly trips to the woodlands, and allowing children the freedom to take control of their learning will be our primary goal. I'm sure it will take their learning to a new dimension.
- Jane Simons is the head teacher at Hungerford Nursery School in Berkshire
Hungerford nursery school
How we work
The school was rebuilt on its original site in 2005 and became a children's centre last August. It has 68 children on its roll and, as a children's centre now offers family learning, parenting classes and out-of-school activities. The children's schedule for the average day is:
- Welcome circle
- Small-group activity, lasting about 20 minutes and with a specific learning intention
- Discussion time, when children plan what to do for the day
- 1 hour 45 mins of uninterrupted child-initiated play (indoors or out)
- Storytime
- Lunchtime
- 1 hr 30 mins of uninterrupted child-initiated play (indoors or out)
- Song/rhyme/game time
- Home circle, when the children can discuss the events of the day
There are no set projects, which staff believe are demotivating. Instead, projects emerge and develop from the children's interests. On one occasion, a boy arrived with a jar of honey, keen to go on a bear hunt. Staff duly obliged and the hunt led to the children dressing up as bears, sharing books about bears and creating model houses for bears. That spilt into an interest in treasure hunts, maps and pirates and led on to bugs.
For more information on the school Visit: www.westberks.org/ GroupHomepage.asp?GroupID=38
LINKS TO EYFS GUIDANCE
- EE 3.2 Supporting Every Child - the learning journey
- EE 3.3 The Learning Environment
- L&D Self-confidence and Self-esteem (pp28-29)
- L&D Language for Communication (pp43-46)
- L&D Movement and Space (pp94-95)
