Sustainable Outdoor Play

There are many advantages to child-initiated play. Children’s emotional development is particularly supported because children are able to make their own choices. They also gain independence skills as they can help themselves to resources. This type of play helps children to be creative as they have to develop their own ideas of how to play indoors and outdoors.

Val she is a director at a Reggie Emilia based center. I asked Mrs. Val how do children play on a nature playground? Mrs. Val’s answer was they use their imaginations and nature to have fun. She also said she likes to observe the children outside and it amazes her how the older kids are ok without having a traditional playground with slides and swings. The second question I asked Mrs. Val was how can parents support their children playing at home? Mrs. Val’s answer was parents can provide a safe environment that offers a variety of play materials and maintain a structured daily routine that includes rest, meals/ snacks, active and quiet activities. She also said that playing with your child helps keep your child engaged in the kind of play where learning occurs. When you engage the child with toys they like or have an interest in, you will be working toward your child’s future success as a student by building important approaches to learning. Play and learning go together. Mrs. Val also stated another way parents can support children is by limiting television viewing and encourage children to engage in physical play

I am a French teacher in Murch Elementary School, and I observed Julian on November 10, 2014 between 11:30 am and 12 pm, during his outdoor play. Julian is 6 years old and he is a boy. He attends a second grade Class in Murch School. Observing Julian during his outdoor play will give me an opportunity to learn more about his physical, social, emotional, and intellectual development. I decided to observe Julian because Julian is a confident child who is taller than other children in his class. He enjoys play outside. Julian is a child who likes smile and runs everywhere. My observation method was to write everything I saw Julian was doing, and there were sufficient staff supervising outdoor play so I was able to concentrate on observing Julian

When planning and providing play opportunities for children and young people, the goal is not to eliminate risk, but to weigh up the risks and benefits. Play is important for children’s well-being and development. It’s also important to provide some risk taking challenging opportunities for all children and young people to encounter or create uncertainty, unpredictability, and potential hazards as part of their play and growing up.

In this techno-world, technology has taken over all the aspects of children’s outdoor play. Some of the constraints that affect outdoor play are risks, parents concerns about outdoor play and not enough play space available for children. Risk is equal to a combination of events/consequences and associated uncertainties (Aven, 2007). Risk in play refers to any possibility of physical injury during play. Early childhood settings usually use the term “risky play” which can be defined as a thrilling and exciting activity that involves a risk of physical injury and play that provides the opportunities for challenge, testing limits, exploring boundaries and learning about injury risk (Sandseter (2007, Little & Wyver, 2008).

By focusing on light and natural resources, and using concepts discussed by Malaguzzi (1994), play-based learning experiences were constructed that encouraged the children to use the environment to learn autonomously. The free-flowing and harmonious learning environments, both indoor and outdoor, are a central component of the learning and teaching relationship. They encourage the children to investigate, explore and interact with the resources, and each other, independently and collaboratively. The experiences reflect the educator using the natural environment as a provocation, an invitation to explore and engender excitement and interest. The use of the natural environment provides multiple benefits for children from stimulating social interaction, development of independence and improving children’s cognitive development (White, as cited in Strong-Wilson & Ellis, 2007, p. 43).

When purchasing a new outdoor playset for your children, one of the most important factors to consider is the material that has been used in its construction. It usually comes down to a few different options, including metal, redwood, and cedar; however, there are several reasons cedar is consistently the most popular choice.

In the past few decades, there has been a dramatic change in the relationship between people and the outdoors. Due to a number of factors, such as, increasing urbanization and loss of access to natural areas; parental fears of strangers, traffic, and even nature itself; competition from other activities such as homework, TV, time on the computer, or playing video games; people are spending an increasing amount of time indoors. Yet there is a growing amount of evidence demonstrating a variety of positive mental, social, and physical health benefits associated with increased exposure to the natural world. From a psychological perspective, there are clear developmental, cognitive, and therapeutic benefits when children and adults experience more nature in their day-to-day lives.

Laurie Hollman (2016), a psychoanalyst, wrote an article on the Huffington post explaining the positive effects of playing outdoors has on children. When a child is able to play outside, they are first learning to coordinate their body with their surroundings. This can either be through playing with a ball, using a swing, playing on a jungle gym, or even playing hop-scotch. When a child is playing with parent outside, they are building a relationship. This

This is a critical analysis of ‘Toward a model of early childhood environmental education: foregrounding, developing and connecting knowledge through Play Based Learning” by Amy Mackezie and Susan Edwards (2013). Researchers want to introduce an innovative learning model in the field of education to help teachers and educator incorporate environmental education while playing in preschool (Cutter & Edwards, 2013). This article engages pedagogical accents allied with environmental education as well as early year’s childhood education (Creswell, 2012). Based on the qualitative research of Amy and Susan, they studied earlier researches and identified new ways to educate young children about environment through play . The main purpose of the study done by Amy and Susan was to develop a thinking model to help early learning educator connect environmental learning in early childhood education.

We know that children have drastically reduced the amount of “play” time in their lives. Meaning the time they spend outside in nature, or experiencing stimuli that are important to their development. This amount was an estimated 25% from 1981 to 1997 and has not increased since (Burdette and Whitaker). This is simply an example of how children are slowly becoming more accustomed to more structured environments for growth, and how they experience less and less “green spaces” in their lives. What is meant by this is the lack of time spent in the natural outdoors and wilderness by children as more technology and more structured environments is developed. There is a term that was coined by Richard Louv in his book “Last Child in the Woods” that aptly describes this relatively new phenomenon in children, Richard calls it

The primary research findings have highlighted that pupils within the lower foundation phase, gain more frequent opportunities and length of time in outdoor learning than the children in upper foundation phase (Figures 2 and 3). All the respondents agreed that outdoor learning is beneficial for children concurring with White (2008), Tovey (2007) and Learning through Landscapes (2010) that children have a lack of access to the outdoor experience in their home life so it is important for schools to provide outdoor provision.

The advantages of children interacting with the natural environment have been promoted to early childhood educators, with theorists such as Froebel (1896) and Steiner (1923) encouraging for children’s relationship with the nature to be nurtured. However in urban development the connectedness with the environment is largely through man made construction. Between 1980 and 2014 the average block size has decreased 8%, yet the average house to block ratio has increasing 28% resulting in less outdoor space in residential areas (Coleman, 2016). With this apparent in society, achieving greater insight into the benefits of natural play affordances in the expansions of children’s learning and skills determines the reasons for offering these resources in educational settings. In this review I will be addressing prominent literature incorporating nature play to gather a greater understanding of the implications on my own research. The research question I will be investigating is “What happened when I introduce natural play spaces to provoke open ended learning?” The aim for this review is to identify the themes in contemporary literature and provide insight into the main learning benefits of interactions with natural resources. The first discussion point will be the benefits for children in learning which nature and natural resources provide; gathering an understanding of the cognitive benefits of interacting with natural play spaces and items. The second discussion point is focussed

The primary research findings have highlighted that pupils within the lower foundation phase gain more frequent opportunities and length of time in outdoor learning than the children in upper foundation phase (Figures 2 and 3). All the respondents agreed that outdoor learning is beneficial for children concurring with White (2008), Tovey (2007) and Learning through Landscapes (2010) that children have a lack of access to the outdoor experience in their home life so it is important for schools to provide outdoor provision.

Environmental education is not always implemented within schools because classrooms are the main space in which students learn and teachers are expected to teach. However, by implementing activities that surround around current events in the environment and by connecting students to nature, this can have positive effects in which it influences the individuals sense of self and their community (Mcinerney, Smyth, & Down, 2011). Research found that children who play in a natural environment to develop better physical skills such as improved motor skills, fitness, and coordination more than other children who play in build environments. They also develop better cognitivitly in which they have increased creativity and problem solving skills