Outdoor Classroom Stories: Walpole Primary School, WA

17th October 2019

Walpole Primary School is a small country school with 38 students. We are surrounded by national parks, including forests, inlets and the ocean. The students spend a lot of time outdoors and enjoy learning about their environment.

We have a kitchen garden which is managed by the gardener and the students. Two students go out each day to help plant, maintain and collect fruit and vegetables. They learn about healthy eating and growing your own produce.
We have set up an outdoor classroom and a fire pit for classes to use during school time but are also used by the students at play times. We recently cooked damper and scones on the fire pit to link with a whole school focus on procedure writing.

Teachers quite often take students outside, when the weather is fine to read or work with partners. The Early Childhood students take their Spelling, Maths and Motor activities outside as well.

There is a bush area where the students collect sticks and build cubbies. They learn to construct and negotiate with others. There is a rope course which encourages balance and a stage, to promote creativity.

Outdoor Classroom Day was designed to get learning happening outdoors so that children engage more readily in activities and have fun while doing so, and our school began participating in the Day to support all of our teachers in using the outdoors as part of their learning environment.

For our Outdoor Classroom Day lessons and learning exercises we used the sandpit for Math (mapping and numeracy), Geography, Spelling and Reading. In the sand pit, the students could use the sand as their paper and record their working out and responses. Answers could be erased quickly. The globe and shifting techtonic plates were also covered in the sandpit, with sand moved around to show shifting of the Earth’s crust. Children sat on logs and read quietly and to each other.

Our students spend varying amounts of time learning outdoors according to their age group and teacher. The minimum is once a week and will be more than once a day for the Early Childhood students.

All of the students enjoy being outdoors and will now often ask if lessons can be taken outside more often. At the start, the children are often distracted by the noises and sights around them, but the more they go outside, they tend to get ‘grounded’, slow down and focus on the task at hand. The two children who garden each day have an opportunity to talk more, ask questions and reflect on their experiences.

Since our first Outdoor Classroom Day we have set up the outdoor classroom with a whiteboard and log seats and a fire pit!

The Outdoor Classroom Day Team would like to thank Walpole Primary School for sharing their story with us.

WANT TO SHARE YOUR OUTDOOR CLASSROOM DAY STORY WITH THE WORLD?

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