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Outdoor Classroom Day

19.05.22:

All of our classes took part in activities in our beautiful outside spaces! Here are some pictures of the day:

Outdoor Classroom Day 2022

20.05.21:

We had an AMAZING time during Outdoor Classroom Day. Here is what each of our classes got up to!:

Acorn Class:

Acorn Nursery were busy collecting natural materials such as twigs, flowers, leaves, lavender and rosemary and making collages and leaf animals, threading the flowers through cardboard pictures to make a vase of flowers to take home. Like every day, they enjoyed playing with all the resources outside in the garden - the mud kitchen, the tunnels, the balls, the water wall, the sandpit. They also went on a bug hunt on the field (in the wind) and ticked off what they found on their investigation sheets. Acorn also joined Chestnut Class for the release of their butterflies in the afternoon.

Chestnut Class:

Chestnut Class started the day outdoors by having snack sitting on the crates. They went on a bug hunt with their magnifying glasses, and found ants, snails, flies, daddy long legs and a couple of ladybirds. Chestnut used chalk to decorate the road area with colourful pictures, used the crates to make an obstacle course and a chocolate stall and enjoyed the water tray and bubbles.

In the afternoon they also braved the wind and rain to make texture rubbings of the different surfaces, had a lovely nature story and let their class butterflies go free!

Birch Class:

As they missed on becoming our first Forest School co-hort, mainly due to Covid.19, Birch class enjoyed an extra special day working with Nell Lee (the Forest School practitioner we are working with as a school). Nell led a wonderful Outdoor Classroom Day for Birch on the back field where they had the opportunity to take part in some self-led, adult-directed and crafty activities, which included:

outdoor reading space wtih hammocks
pretend fire and group chat
willow crowns
chalk and clay painting
flower pressing
minibeasting
hapazome (leaf bashing)
elder bracelets

Hazel Class:

In the morning, Hazel made their very own Micro-journey. They created a route using a long length of wool and then using their Lego character, they created their own fictional story about their character's adventure. They used descriptive language and expression in their voices as they verbally told their adventure stories. They recorded their stories using our class ipads. This will support our creative writing wonderfully.

In the afternoon, Hazel hunted around the school grounds for things that are living, things that were once alive and things that have never been alive. They then went on a creature hunt, looking for any wildlife that lives in our school grounds. They recorded what they found and where they found them (their habitat). This links to our current Science topic.

Rowan Class:

Rowan completed a fun Science Challenge Cards activity where they had to find the different things on each card and use the iPads to photograph or film them (e.g. find something waterproof). Later on in the day, they learnt about Plants and went on a 'plant hunt', where they sketched different plants that they could find on our school grounds. They also learnt about some important 'Plant Hunters' that travelled the world and brought back new plants to our country.

Oak Class:

Oak took part in a maths scavenger hunt on the playground. They had to answer the questions on the sheet, find the answer around the playground then scan the QR code with their iPad to uncover the secret letter - lots of fun!

They also did some ‘emotional mapping’, looking at a map of the school and plotting points to say how they felt about each area using emojis. It led to a discussion about how they would improve the school, especially what they think the old computer suite should be. Ideas such as a craft room, a new library with bean bags and a board game room were some!

A child also suggested they eat lunch outside, so they took the tables to their covered area and enjoyed a nice, sociable lunch.

In the afternoon Oak got creative in their outside area and made armature Anglo Saxon statues - great fun and very messy!

Clophill St Marys CofE lower school