Next week, October 18th, is Take me Outside day. In honour of this day, I thought it would be fitting to use an activity that has been designed for the outdoors. Taking a students education outside can help boost their creative and imaginative skills, boost energy, lessen anger and aggression, improve overall health as well as great way to break up a day or get their bodies moving. Children that are exposed to nature are said to have increased concentration, self-discipline and behaviour. Natural environments allow children to become aware of the world around them. Natural light and sunlight effects children’s mental health by naturally stimulating the brain to a produce mood enhancing chemical known as serotonin. Serotonin, is our bodies natural way of making us feel good by lifting our moods, helping us sleep and managing our appetites. Taking a students education outside is a fun way to focus on the mental well being of students all while expanding the walls of their learning environment. The rise of outdoor classrooms can be seen across Canada and the United States.. While some critics say that this is a passing trend, the benefits of the green classroom or outdoor learning centre speaks for itself. Outdoor classrooms can be very basic, made of rocks or logs, to elaborate settings including black board, white boards and full roofs to cover the area. The important part of the centre is to get children outside, breathing in fresh air and increasing their overall health.
This weeks activity is an outdoor gratitude scavenger hunt that could be expanded or adapted based on the age of the students. Outdoor scavenger hunts like this activity create many curricular opportunities that can be expanded to other areas of learning such as English Language Arts, Mathematics, Physical Education, Social Studies and Science. The list of a curricular lessons that could be created from this are endless.
As a mindful Morning exercise, this activity is a great way to learn how to respect the world and natural environment as well as to be aware of leaving ‘no trace‘ when entering a forest or nature setting. This activity can be completed while students sit quietly in the outdoor learning environment or while taking a short walk through some near by natural setting. Individually students move through a list of items, such as the one below, and find things in nature that fit that description without removing that item from nature. The task could be to take 2 or 3 of these things from the list and explain why they make you feel this way. Again this could be an individual activity that students write in a journal or it could be an activity that they bring back to a sharing circle. The important part is that they are outside, moving, taking in natural light and increasing their moods.
