Outdoor Classroom Day
Friday, September 7th the Aranmore Catholic Primary School students took advantage of the beautiful Spring weather and enjoyed lessons outside.
Outdoor Classroom Day is a global campaign to celebrate and inspire outdoor learning and play. Outdoor learning improves children’s health and engages them in nature play where they can apply their skills and knowledge to a variety of activities.
Classes enjoyed lessons outside that covered the nine learning areas of the curriculum.
Pre-Primary: On Thursday morning we set up a range of activities for the children to explore and freely move between. We had a nature scavenger hunt, a water trolley with sea creatures, rocks and sticks to build and use their imagination with, nature art table as well as gross motor activities like hula hoops and running races. We also came together and played ‘ring a ring a rosy’. What a fabulous day outside admiring and learning in nature.
Year 1 Green: We found leaves around the oval then traced around them. We created some cool leaf people! We integrated this activity with our school safari science topic.
Year One Red: We started our Literacy session outside on the tennis courts. We played different spelling games using bean bags and hoops. This was a lot of fun! From there we went and ate our crunch and sip in the adventure playground. After we went for a hunt for all different types of leaves around the playground and in the school garden. We brought the leaves back to the room and used them to create our art piece for the week. We used the leaves by rubbing crayons over them to create ant nests/burrows under the ground. We had a lot of fun in one red for outdoor learning day.
Year Two: We planted seeds and also went to the back oval for a Listening Mission –Sat back to back and listened to sounds and identified them and then we finished with a spirited games of Scarecrow.
Year 3: For Religion, we prayed and wrote prayers to Mary outside, surrounded by the garden and peace and quiet. We have been reading ‘THE BFG’ in class so it was time next to see just how BIG the Fleshlumpeater giant really was! First, we had to find out how long 54 feet was, then convert it into metres and centimetres. It was fun drawing what we thought the giants looked like. Now we can imagine just how massive the BFG is. It was time to start our new Mathematics concept – Capacity. We had various containers that we had to fill with water and then measure how much each could hold.
Year 4: Working as a team to create teepees just using sticks from the playground and wool was a real challenge. The children in small groups collected similar size sticks and had to build an Indian teepee by joining them with wool. A lot of collaboration and patience was required. Problem solving skills were definitely put to the test. Success was very rewarding. The final products were fabulous. A simple activity that the children enjoyed doing outside in the beautiful sunshine.
Year 5 Red: Today we celebrated outdoor classroom day. We began by doing some meditation on the oval followed by our spelling lesson. We then moved to the tennis courts where we wrote our times tables with chalk and had a rock tower building competition. After that, we had a spelling competition where the girls had to write as many spelling words that they could while the boys shot the basketball through a hoop. Then we swapped. The boys tried extremely hard but the girls won! It was lots of fun.
Year 6 Red: We spent some time on the oval and completed our Spelling Mastery activities. We also did a brief meditation where we had the opportunity to stop and listen to our wonderful world around us.
Year 6 Green: Today we focused on Religion. We reflected on the seven petitions of the Lord’s Prayer and how we can apply it to our lives.
It was a very successful day. The children thoroughly enjoyed participating in lessons outdoors.
We look forward to the next one.
