Background information

Content information for educators (also suitable for parents): We often hear in the media that children are suffering from an increasing range of both mental and physical diseases, including depression, anxiety, diabetes, obesity, asthma, allergies, etc. Simply providing opportunities for your children to play outside will help them to grow up both happy and healthy. What is your fondest childhood memory….?

There is a growing body of research, as well as a great deal of media coverage about the amount of time children, are now spending inside, connected to electronic devices, rather than having regular opportunities to be outside. There are a number of reasons suggested for this including increasing urbanisation and reduced access to green spaces, risks associated with outdoor play, and our increasingly busy and scheduled lifestyles. This is having a significant effect on children’s development, health and wellbeing.

Nature Play WA (https://youtu.be/-vAulkMldMM)

The benefits of unstructured outdoor play are numerous, including:

Opportunities for building skills in resilience, problem-solving, critical thinking, observation, investigation and risk assessment;
Opportunities to movement developing both fine and gross motor skills;
Opportunities for quiet time to reflect, focus and be still and calm;
Provision of a range of sensory inputs promoting brain development;
Building an understanding of their world and their relationship with nature;
Opportunities for building skills in communication and teamwork.

Often an early childhood setting is the only place where children have regular access to the outdoors. This makes the outdoor elements of your program that much more important. The more time you can spend outside the better!

“At the end of the day, your feet should be dirty, your hair messy and your eyes sparkling!” - Shanti

Definitions:

Green Space – an area outside where natural elements such as plants, soil, sand, water, or animals are present e.g. backyard, outdoor play space, park, etc.
Unstructured Play – open-ended play with no predetermined learning objective.
Habitat – the natural home of a plant, animal or other organisms.
Sensory – an experience or action that stimulates the physical senses such as sight, smell, taste, touch, hearing.

New words for children to learn:

Senses
Habitat
Nature

Activity

The Sensory Garden: Ages - 0 to 2

What to do:

Prepare a low garden bed (low enough that the children can reach, or even get into!), or range of pots or containers for planting; soil; straw or mulch; and a range of plants (seeds or seedlings) that smell, taste, feel and sound different. Select you plants, it is good to use herbs and other edible plants, particularly for infants, so that they are able to taste as well as smell, see, feel and hear. Try and use different plants the provide a range of textures (e.g sage is soft and a bit furry, rosemary smells great and is hard and leathery, basil is soft and has flowers, chives are thin and have flowers); nasturtiums and pansies are also great for a bit of colour depending on the time of the year. Be careful about planting plants that may attract bees.

Plant the plants in your garden bed or container according to the instructions provided on the pack (or tag), let the children get involved, they can dig, poke with their fingers to make holes, and water. Care for your plants over time and once established the children can explore them with all of their senses. Think about using some of the “flavours” in cooking something simple like pasta and adding basil, and see if the flavour or smell is familiar, add some herbs to play dough. Pick some of the plants and bring them inside for use in the home corner kitchen or use pots or create paths to create a maze or path to a secret place.

Provocations:

I wonder what will grow from these seeds?
I wonder what the seeds need to grow?
I wonder what we can do to look after the seeds / seedlings?
I wonder what the plant feels / smells / tastes like?
I wonder if you can hear the sound of the breeze blowing through the leaves?
I wonder what happens when we scrunch up the leaves?
I wonder how we can look after the plants?
I wonder what else grows from a seed?

Possible lines of development:

Other things that grow from seeds.
Bugs in the garden.
Edible gardens.
Other interesting things in nature – clouds, leaves, rain, sand, mud, water.
What else eats / visits these plants.
Collect seeds and plant next year.
Use herbs or plants in other ways (cooking, sensory play dough, add to clay, etc).

The grass is greener: Ages - 2 to 3

What to do:

Preparation: Gather a shallow container (if you want to be able to move it, don’t make it too big!); some soil appropriate for growing grass; grass seeds, something to make drainage holes in the bottom of your container (a drill or screwdriver might work); and some mesh (flywire could work) or geotextile that will allow water to drain but keep your soil in the container.

If you can’t have grass in your outside space, this activity might just be for you! Put some holes in the bottom of the container and cover the bottom with your mesh or geotextile fabric. Fill your container with the soil. Spread the grass seeds over the top as per the directions on the packet and water. The children can watch the grass grow, noticing how long it takes, do they need to protect it from birds or other animals? Children can also water the grass every couple of days. You may like to encourage them to put any water that they have not drunk at meal or snack times into a bucket or watering can that they can then use to water the grass.

Once the grass has grown you can use it inside or outside to create small world imaginative play spaces. You could use whatever is on hand, or what the children are interested in right now. It maybe dinosaurs, fairies, animals, farms, etc. The possibilities are endless! This is a great way for services who have limited access to natural elements in their play space to bring a little “green” to their environment. If you have chosen a larger container or even a garden bed children can sit on the grass and play. Notice if their play is different when natural materials are used.

Note: if you don’t want to grow grass, you could plant other plants, or alternatively use sand, soil or mulch to create small world imaginative play spaces.

Provocations:

I wonder what will grow from these seeds?
I wonder what the seeds need to grow?
I wonder what we can do to look after the seeds?
I wonder what the grass feels / smells like?
I wonder if you can hear the sound of the breeze blowing through the grass?
I wonder how we can look after the grass?
I wonder what else grows from a seed?

Possible lines of development:

Other things that grow from seeds.
Plant a sensory garden / pots.
Bugs in the garden.
Edible gardens.
Other interesting things in nature – clouds, leaves, rain, sand, mud, water.
What animals eat grass.
Cut the grass with scissors.
Weeding and mulching of garden beds.

Design a Habitat Garden: Ages - 3 to 5

What to do:

Preparation: Gather some clipboards, paper, pencils and crayons; some bird, mammal, reptile and bug identification books, posters, or cards which include things you might find in your local area (there are also some great apps if you are that way inclined!). Don’t forget the magnifying glasses!

Spend a bit of time outside observing what sort of creatures visit your outside space. Encourage children to find a quiet comfortable spot where they can sit and observe animals coming and going, encourage them to look up in the trees and down on the ground, around rocks and logs. Look closely, there could be big and small things, birds, lizards, bugs or worms. It will be helpful to have a discussion first about how to observe these creatures safely without hurting them, or putting themselves in danger of being stung or bitten. Ask them to observe what the creatures they see are doing (are they eating, drinking, lying in the sun, building a nest or burrow, etc).

Ask the children to use the tools provided (posters, cards, books, apps, etc.) to identify what they have seen. It may also be interesting to talk about what they didn’t see, that they thought they might. Talk about what the creatures were doing while they were observing and think about why they might have been doing that. Then discuss with the children what they think the creatures needs might be based on what they observe (shape of their beak, type of teeth, where they live, what they eat). These questions will build a picture of the habitat requirements of their creature. This might be good to do in small groups, particularly if a number of children have observed the same creature.

Get them to think about the following questions:

What does my creature eat? (nectar, bugs, rotting leaves, etc.)
Where does it live? (in the ground, under rocks, in trees, in bushes, etc)
What does it make its home in? (nest, burrow, tree hollow, etc.)
What does it need to be happy and healthy? (shade, water, food, protection from predators, etc)
What might it do for fun?

Once they have come up with some answers to these questions, ask them to use some materials from the garden or craft area to create a place for their creature that meets all of the needs they identified. This may be a drawing, a model, a small habitat outside in a pot or garden bed. They could then take a picture of their creations.

Provocations:

I wonder what creatures we can find outside?
I wonder what we need to do to make sure we find some creatures?
I wonder what we need to do to make sure we are safe and the creatures are safe?
I wonder what they eat?
I wonder where they live?
I wonder where it makes its home?
I wonder what it needs to be happy and healthy?
I wonder if it has any predators?
I wonder what tricks it uses to keep safe?
I wonder if there are creatures that live here that we didn’t see. Why didn’t we see them?

Possible lines of development:

Build a habitat garden for a type of creature you would like to attract to your outside space (it is better to provide plants that birds and animals use for food and shelter rather than feeding them).
Build some nest boxes or a bird bath.
Camouflage.
Prey and predators.
Visit the Zoo and talk about different habitats around the world (rainforest, desert, grasslands, alpine, wetlands, oceans, etc).

Evaluation

Complete an analysis of learning listing evidence about:

Belonging	Find something of interest
Communication	Express an idea or feeling
Exploration	Engage with challenge and persist when difficulty arises
Well being	Being involved

Embedding into daily practice

Consider the many ways you might use your outside space as a valuable learning space, that offers a range of experiences to children. Consider how they might experience different aspects of your outside space in different seasons.
Go beyond your fence and connect with natural spaces in your local community or head out a bit further afield.
Encourage families to spend time outside with their children, give them some tips about what they could do or events happening in the local area.

Greener Spaces

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