Top Trouble Number 3: Little or no equipment for outdoor use:

Equipment in schools and limited budgets is always an issue, indoors and outdoors. How often have you had an inspirational teaching idea but been limited due to resources? I can honestly say I have never let lack of equipment hold me back. Even on my teaching practice in an inner city school where every piece of equipment bar the photocopier had been stolen, yes even pens and pencils, all I had was mountains of sugar paper and I created the most amazing things from nothing. If you can’t make it from cardboard and masking tape, paint, paper, string, porridge, flour and anything of low cost I am not interested! Low funds in school have meant I have had to be extra creative with resources; approaching local packaging companies for surplus cardboard gave me the largest amount of cardboard our school had ever seen. In chapter 10 we will explore cardboard and cheap resources in more depth. Trailing the local pounds shops has also provided me with a wealth of resources, paint brushes, spades, hats and costumes, sticky tape (6 rolls for a £1!), the list of my pound treasures is endless.

P.E. equipment is a fantastic start to learning outdoors, have a look in the cupboard and see what’s there. Playground games books are full of ideas and often include Numeracy and literacy ideas within them. I first started with an old P.E. trolley full of ‘Top Start’ equipment I found gathering dust in a cupboard. For our first term of outdoor learning these were our tools, we played number games, alphabet games, sung, clapped, skipped and jumped our way into a fabulous curriculum.

Often our indoor equipment is in abundance in certain areas, make boxes to take outside. Split your equipment up so you have an outdoor set. Share resources amongst classes, have whole school boxes of clip boards and pencils, skipping ropes, quoits, small world resources, topic boxes, boxes brushes and most of all blankets and materials – you are never too old to build a den.

Is lack of equipment and clothing just an excuse to stay inside?

Extract from Learning Outside the Primary Classroom a cost effective approach by Shonette Bason

Shonette’s recommended 7 Habits of an effective outdoor classroom

  1. Make a commitment to yourself and your team (and your children) to go outside EVERYDAY. Educate every team member into why going outside is an important part of children’s development.
  2. Remember the majority of children LOVE to go outside. It’s adults who don’t like the weather so make sure all adults are weather proof. Ski pants are great in winter months and some of the cheaper retailers do great deals on hats, scarves and gloves.
  3. The cheapest products make the most outdoor fun. Shaving foam, mash and porridge provide hours of messy fun and have unlimited uses and are cost effective.
  4. Draw out your outdoor space – as nig or small as it is its all you have got so draw it out and look at what you have got. You are only human to dream of pirate ships and pergolas’… however our reality can be very different and our budgets even tighter than we thought.
  5. Create a learning environment outdoors by changing the name of your outdoor space. By doing this you will promote the value of outdoors to parents/carers, staff, children and senior management. I always call mine the ‘outdoor classroom’. A posh title can be the outdoor learning environment!
  6. Invest in outdoor clothing. If money cant be found fund raise – sponsored bounces raise the most for us. Put a whole school call out for secondhand wellies, macs, scarves and hats. It’s a start when I first started my outdoor classroom I was given 15 pairs wellies and bought 10 supermarket pac-a-mac’s it meant despite the weather 10 children got to go outside and the five children who had weather proof coats could too!
  7. Finally number seven has to be HAVE FUN OUTDOORS! There is no getting away from the time, dedication and patience needed to create an outstanding outdoor environment in which empowered learning can take place. But what outdoor classroom’s give the children in terms of developmental needs far out weighs any ‘adult’ grips. My results rose dramatically on the implementation of an active outdoor curriculum. Yours can too but you need to have a FEW approach – Fun, excitement and willingness to just go outdoors, despite the weather.