As it is an Ofsted requirement that children have access to outdoor play, it is highly important that the outdoor provision provides just as much learning as the indoors if not more. All children enjoy playing outside and exploring their surroundings. Through carefully planning and using resources efficiently the outdoors can provide children with vast learning opportunities benefiting may areas of their learning and development. Many people suggest that some children learn better outside than opposed to inside, this is often the case with boys.
- Sensory area –To create a sensory area in our garden and plant different herbs, create pond area for children and allow them to investigate different insects and bugs, hanging wind chimes from trees, adding mirrors to a wall. To use tuff spot trays on the floor filled with different sensory resources.
- Maths area – It is important that maths is incorporated into the environment; To incorporate natural materials such as twigs, stones, shells fir cones in maths area and add resources such plants pots with numbers on, weighing scales, muffin tins. All of these open-ended resources are ideal for helping develop children’s maths skills as well as their imagination and creativity.
- Water Wall –To create area using plastic tubes, funnels, water cans, buckets plastic bottles. By fixing these to a piece of trellis or a wooden pallet. Children of all ages will enjoy pouring water down these tubes and collecting it in the buckets below. To place some plastic tubes down low enough for the younger children, or to create one water wall for the baby area and a larger one for the older children.
