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Hi everyone!

I am a future elementary teacher and I'm looking into different ways to incorporate outdoor learning into the science classroom. Besides community/school gardens and nature hikes, do you have any neat ideas? Or even specific activities to do within the garden/on nature walks? If anyone has experience applying for/receiving grants for their outdoor education programs, I'd love to hear about that, too. 

Thank you!!

Hannah 

Hi Hannah, 

  One idea with nature walks is relating them to reading specifically phonics. After talking about different letter sounds students go on a nature walk and find items that have that sound in the name. An example would be A so students could see on the nature walk and record they found an Apple. I hope this helps. 

All the best, 

  Lizzy Inselmann 

Hi Hannah, 

I am a third-year elementary education major from Wartburg College. Taking students outside and into a different environment other than the typical classroom environment has a lot of value and usually leads to more impactful learning experiences for students. Creating authentic learning experiences for students and allowing them to connect with their content by relating it to the world around them will also increase your chances of students retaining the knowledge they are gaining. Outdoor learning gives teachers a great opportunity to incorporate inquiry into the curriculum. Travel to a local pond and allow students to write down what they notice and what they are curious about and then create a lesson based on their curiosities. You could also be more intentional with your lesson and have students identify specific types of clouds during a weather unit or you could include a physics lesson to see which objects soar down a class-made ramp the fastest. 

Best, 

Ella Brase 

Hi Hannah, 

Some ideas could be exploring nature and taking the students out to look at the trees and maybe even take them on a nature walk. This would be really interesting and engaging for the students.  You can also do different science lessons and experiments. 

Best, 

Caroline

Hi Hannah, 

my name is Amber Baker. I am a senior majoring in elementary education at Wright State University. There is a lot of benefit to bringing students outside. Students need one-on-one experience with science. They also need as much opportunity as possible to practice science. The more they practice science the more likely they are to see themselves as scientists.  

some activities could be as simple as taking them outside and having them record observations about what they see. You want to connect what your students are learning to their real-life experiences. 

My group taught a whole science lesson about ecosystems and their components (producers, consumers, and decomposers) to fifth graders just by stepping out the door of their school. 

I hope this helps,

Amber Baker

Hello Hannah!! 

I am a 4th-grade science teacher and I LOVE  having science outside. I think the first piece of advice I would give you is not to wait until your lesson actually involves outside to get outside. Using fold-up tables or even just a space in your school parking lot you can have class outside. In the first few months of school, while it's still warm, I try to get outside as much as possible. I've found that by providing guided and fill-in-the-blank notes I can rely less on my projector and slides and we can go over vocab outdoors. Need to create a graph of your class experiment results? Break out the chalk and make a giant bar graph outside! 

One of our class projects is also to plan and maintain our school garden. We design its layout, research which flowers will survive the best, budget, and shop for supplies. All the fourth graders take turns weeding and maintaining it during the year. If you don't have a garden you can just plant some class plants. You can make a project out of it. Grow the seeds in bags, transfer the seedlings to planters, re-pot them once they outgrow their pots, and allow families to adopt them at the end of the year and plant them at home. 

If you have a place to go on a nature walk preserving and drying out flowers or cataloging different types of leaves is always fun. 

Hello Hannah!

I think getting students outside to experience science is extremely important and I love that you are interested in it. One thing I did at a local school with fifth grade students was take them outside and ask them to make observations about how organisms in the ecosystem were interacting. One thing that I loved about this activity is that it can be conducted in any ecosystem. You can have students make observations at school or near their own homes! Once I gave students time to make observations, I introduced vocabulary specific to the topic (producer, consumer, decomposer, energy, etc). I think letting students interact with nature and then teaching them about the specific content at hand is very important. So many standards can be connected to outdoor learning. 

Best of luck in your teaching! 

Allie Corwin

Hello!

My name is Samantha DiMaggio and I am a junior in college studying to be an elementary teacher. I think teaching science outside of the classroom and in nature is a great idea! Students will be able to learn about nature, habitats, animals, insects and so much more by actually being in the environment. Some fun and engaging activities that I hope to do with my future students are projects such as creating a garden outside and watching our plants grow or examining the different types of insects living in the environment. Its one thing to be reading about science but its so much more interactive and effective for young learners to have the opportunity of being outside in nature and experiencing science firsthand. Some other topics that can be taught outside are lessons on pollution, weather, habitats and different types of species. I remember in first grade i went on a fieldtrip to Doorbrook Park and the enitre class went looking for fossils in the lakes and wilderness of this park. I remember how fun and interesting this was to shuffle through rocks and just be outside of the classroom setting. Another interesting activity is having the students plant plants outside and water them. This could teach young students about pollinators, bees, butterflies, different types of plants, and plant survival. Another fun idea is building birdhouses with the students which could follow a lesson on how different types of animals of the same species obtain food. 

I wish you the best of luck in your classrom!

Samantha DiMaggio

I have an activity where students observe the moon at the same time every day (or evening) for two weeks and see how it changes phases and changes its position in the sky. This can be done either during the daytime (e.g., as a class) or in the evening (individually or with family members).

Matt

Hi Hannah!

Outdoor learning is a great topic to discuss and I also look forward to incoporating that into my classroom. I beleive that learning outside, especially in a class such as science, is great for the students becasue they get to see the lesson in a new environment with fresh air. In particular, during covid times, this is a great oppurtunity to get the children excited about learning. I think that a good suggestion would be to read a book to them outside. If the book can somehow relate to the outdoors, than their learning will be increased even further. 

Hi Matthew, outdoor learning is great for children! I agree that during these times it's been difficult for everyone especially the little ones so your idea sounds awesome. I remember back when I was in 5th or 6th grade my science teacher would always make fun and engageful lesson plans that had to do with outdoor learning. One of them being the butterfly project when we went over the transitional stages and towards the end we set them free outside or when we planted our own little flowers outside. I'm a preservice teacher now in New Jersey and the fact that I still remember most of the lessons I did with my science teacher from elementary school speaks volume about her philosophy of teaching. The children will always cherish and remember those fun and engageful activities.