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What are some fun and engaging outdoor activities that can be done with students?

I was looking for similar activities earlier this year and I discovered this website. I hope this is helpful http://lifestyle.howstuffworks.com/crafts/quick-easy-crafts/easy-outdoor-science-activities-for-kids.htm

Animals and plants can be explored outdoors. It is important not to allow the students to touch any animals or plants while outside. Observation can be a great tool for students.

Another thing that students can do outside is observe the water cycle in different cups throughout the day.

I did this fun outdoor activity with the students. Sponge race. Each participant in this race needs a sponge and two buckets, one filled with water, and the other empty. Participants run from the empty bucket to the full bucket across the yard, filling the sponge and returning to the empty bucket to squeeze the water into it. The first person to fill the empty bucket to the designated line wins.

I think that outdoor activities are great to keep children engaged and having fun without realizing they are learning. An activity that we did in a K classroom was to go outside and find different leaves. The students loved going around the field area looking for different leaves. They loved being able to discover new leaves. We then went inside where the students took there leaves and painted one side and then made a print of the leaf onto a paper. This helps integrate science, math, and art all into one lesson.

One good outdoor event is a nature walk, especially with younger children because everything excites them. You can have them look for butterflies or collect leaves depending on the weather. Once you all are in the classroom or even outside you can discuss their findings.

I have attached a link to a family education website that offers several fun outdoor activities for students. http://fun.familyeducation.com/play/outdoor-activities/33394.html

When I observed a second grade class, the students were learning about different types of bugs in science. My cooperating teacher allowed the students to go outside to the field of the school to search for them. The school had many rolly pollies laying around in their backyard, so the students got to collect a good amount and observe them. The students really enjoyed exploring the field and observing the bugs. In general, I think if you allow the students the opportunity to use their discovery and exploring skills they will be more engaged and learn much more than doing something such as worksheets.

I did a lesson the other day where we went outside and observe and record the weather. I did that the whole week of observing and recording what they see in their science journal. This class was first graders. They enjoyed it very much. They record answers such as it is cold or warm, rainy or sunny, windy or calm, etc. The answers were recorded by a drawing, descriptive words, and then sentences.

I've seen my cooperating teacher have student make a drawing of a peaceful place outside on the concrete basketball court. She taught an art lesson no Peaceable Kingdom by Edward Hicks. The students interpreted the painting in the classroom and painted their own interpretation of a peaceful place outside on the concrete using chalk. This was fun and engaging for her students because they were able to draw outside with chalk. Any child would love this. They had fun and learned at the same time. Hope this helps.

Some of my favorites for young children outdoors: For preschoolers- scavenger hunt. Instead of giving them a list, draw some sections on a big piece of butcher paper. Label each with a word and drawing of something they might find, for example: acorn, pinecone, stick, leaf, etc. I've found they could find things and bring them back to put them on the paper for an extended period of time. Then you can lead discussions about what you found the most of, what colors you see, etc. Build mini-habitats- if you are studying habitats you can have students build a habitat for an imaginary, tiny animal. This is sort of like a fairy house activity, but you will emphasize the needs of the habitat: food, water, shelter, light, space, air. Kids can then give you a tour of their habitat. Get to know a tree! They can make bark and leaf rubbings, see if they can reach their arms around the trunk, observe closely with a magnifying glass to see if there is anything living on the bark, etc. This is great to do over the course of a year so that they can note the changes the tree goes through.

Hi- A few months ago my class did an outside activity based on NGSS 4-LS. We had several materials in class for students to choose from and used the scientific questions to guide our activity: Are mealworms attracted to a certain scent? Students had to present a claim and results. We got to test our predictions with live mealworms on the playground blacktop. I'm sure if you entered this topic online there would be specific resources to guide your lesson.

Hello! We did a lot of fun outdoor activities with my little ones during activity times. On a nice day we would set up their art stations outside. Some days we would have a table or two outside with crayons, markers or paint. If we had enough time to set up we would also place the painting easels outside for finger paint (this was for my 4-5 years old). We would give them time to paint their surroundings. We would do it a couple of times in the winter and a couple of times in the spring in order to give everyone an opportunity and also have them label their paintings with their names, the date and the season we were in. This way when we were going over our current season or just the seasons in general we could refer back to their work which they always loved being recognized for.

There are tons of great outdoor activities for students that involve science lessons. One can be the melting of ice cubes in different locations around their playgroup. Students can record their answers and compare with peers why some melted faster than others. Having a Science Scavenger hunt can be an interacting activity for the children. When talking about Biodiversity, the students can go outside and find different organisms and how they are all connected to the same biodiversity. This website has a lot of different ideas and examples that can be used for outdoor activities: http://www.growingajeweledrose.com/2013/03/outdoor-nature-gardening-activities.html

I love the idea of taking students outside to engage them in learning, especially at the younger elementary grade level. I student taught kindergarten, and our kids loved any opportunity to get outside. Obviously, we did all of our P.E. outside, which is a really essential part of their day; however, we went outside to engage our students in other disciplines as well. We took our students on a "tree walk" for our science class. Students were learning about the anatomy of a tree and so, we took them outside to obverse them first hand. We also had students draw sketches and engage in discussions about what parts of the tree the recognized. I think any opportunity to get students out of the classroom and engaged outside is great!

A fun and engaging outdoor activity that can be done with students is a nature walk. You can take them around the school's garden and teach them about living and nonliving things. They can use their 5 senses to observe and write their observations down in their journals. You can also go outside and look for different types of leaves and create a classroom chart of different leaves. Young children would have a great time doing this! Hope this helps! Good luck :)

Today my second grade class was learning about temperature, and thermometers. They went outside to check the temperature and to the wind . The kids were excited as soon as they heard they were going outside. Actually having them go outside and check the temperature, got the point across much better.

One great outdoor activity I did with students was a relay race. The students were given a brief introduction about the difference between voluntary and involuntary muscles. They were also taught that our body systems work as a team to help us function. Then, the students were instructed on the rules of the relay race. During the relay race they were able to practice using their involuntary and voluntary muscles, (Heart, lungs and leg muscles). They were also able to practice team work. This would help them make connections to our body and how it works as a team. I liked this activity because not only science standards were fulfilled, but students were able to appreciate the idea of team work.

Here is a website with some ideas for outdoor activities. http://www.science-sparks.com/2013/05/19/summer-science/

Hello, there are a lot of outside activities you can do with children, it all depends what you would like them to learn. A good activity is for kids to plant their own garden. If you do not have enough room they can plant a seed in a cup. This will allow the kids to watch it grow. I have done this activity with kids before and they love it. Also, it will teach them responsibility because if they don't take care of it it will die.

Not sure which grade you are looking for in this case. A nature walk is always an exciting thing to do with younger grades.

A nature walk is a great idea! Rae--what are some things you do with children on your nature walks?

What is a great outdoor resource activity?

One of my favorite ideas for outside learning is a nature hike. This activity is fun and free. The students take a walk around their campus and discover nature that they didn't notice before. As an extension have the students collect pieces of nature and create a collage or image from the leaves and rocks or fallen flowers.

Bottle rockets! Kids go crazy over being able to build and revise, and challenge each other! All students will be engaged!

I think outside activities are so essential for a good science class. You could do nature walks, going outside and observing certain things assigned by the teacher, taking water sampkes, soil samples, or collecting rocks. We are doing a great project in my college class which I think would be great to incorporate into elementary science class. It is called the Greening Down Project and it includes picking a tree,observing it twice a wk for 2 months, and recording changes. I have done 4 observations and already see and think about trees differently. I also notice things I have not noticed before. IT'S GREAT!!!!!

We were talking about solar energy today as a class and one fun activity that is outdoors based could be cooking an egg in a pan and allowing the students to observe the changes. The students could also be given foil, magnifying glass and other materials to see if they can get their egg to cook faster. It is important to review safety issues for this but it can still be fun and engaging. 

You might take a look at the activities in the 2015 Living Schoolyard Month Activity Guide here: http://www.greenschoolyardsamerica.org/2015-living-schoolyard-month-activity-guide.html 

I also made a video about the importance of place-based education for use with teachers and administrators (in case you need to 'sell' the idea): http://www.joeynoelle.com/2014/10/place-based-education.html 

Best,

Joey

In my science methods class we actually spent the whole class time talking about energy. My group had solar energy and our activity included students going outside to see an egg cook on a pan. I think this activity would be great for all grade levels. Minor changes and modifications could be made depending on the grade. This will really apply a class content to the real-world. 

I think building a butterfly garden would be a great activity. Depending on the school's resources, students can plant a garden or a few plants around the school. The plant and tree cycle can be implemented and the students get to feel and see the different parts of a plant and how they grow. By taking care of the plants, they will learn what it takes and the amount it took for the plants to grow. 

Interesting. Extremely helpful will take this back when I am on the field. 

Have them explore Animal and plants. Fun activity.

Outdoor activities are important for students. Outdoor activities can range from free play to purposeful play. For example, for science I had students explore their surroundings to find different natural resources and discuss their findings with peers. 

great ideas!

There are so many great resources out there at your fingertips. One particular site that I found that would be great for a number of ages is as follows.  http://andreasnotebook.com/25-outdoor-science-experiments-for-kids/ This site has so many great ideas that tie science and fun together!!

I am a really big fan of the great outdoors, i think students should learn outside in order to be active and express themselves freely. Especially when learning science, students should be hands on with their experiments and develop their own learning. A few outdoor activities can include planting a garden as a class and learning how plants grow and their needs. As well as making volcanoes, bubbles, cloud in a cup, bottle rockets and more! I look forward to working on these activities with my future classroom and teaching them how fun science can be when its student directed and hands on!  

What are some fun and engaging outdoor activities that can be done with students? In early  childhood, children are just starting to become aware of their senses. Maybe an outdoor activity that can be implemented with the kids is to use their five senses. They can go smell flowers, feel rocks and grass, listen to what sounds they hear etc. They can also walk around to look for habitats. For example, an ant pile or an bird's nest. For early childhood, activities that involve discovery outdoors will be beneficial. 

I recently taught a science lesson about leaves and how they change color because of the seasons. An outdoor activity I planned was to have a "leaf hunt", for which we spent some time outside looking for leaves. I also had the students use their magnifying glass to take a closer look at the leaves.

I am doing a force and motion activity with my fourth grade students, what kind of outside activities seem engaging and exciting?

A life walk is a perfect example of an outdoor activity for the students. It is also a good idea, if your school has a garden, to have students take a look at what the garden has and maybe plant their own seeds. 

I really love the nature ideas and to add on, they can explore their playground. They can look at force within the swing set or the slide, or for energy, they can look at mechanical energy, potential and kinetic energy. A great example would be kicking a ball and identifying where the potential and kinetic energy take place or doing this with the swings. 

There are a multitude of ways to get students outside and exploring! It really depends on what grade level you are thinking of. However, for 3rd grade, one of the NGSS standards talks about weather. A good way to get them outside, either at home or in class is to have them take some time to observe the weather everyday and notice certain patterns. In 5th grade, they can start observing the solar system and even make observations about the cycles of the moon! In the lower grades, you could have students observe the life cycles of pumpkins or other plants! Nature walks are always beneficial and fun as well! Here are some more ideas as well!  http://www.science-sparks.com/2014/04/22/outdoor-science-experiments/ 

I really like all of the ideas everyone has for activities student can do outside.   The idea of having students go outside and write down what they think is 'alive', or not considered 'alive', would be very fun an educational for many grades.  I would love to see all of the many ideas students come up with depending on what they can observe at their school.

There are some really creative and interesting activities here! Thank you for sharing. I love the idea of a good nature walk. It gets the kids outside and active while teaching them about numerous naturally occurring phenomena. They will be learning without even knowing it!

Thank you for sharing all of these interesting and engaging activities to use outdoors!

Have the students explore animal and plant habitats outdoors in their school playground or garden! They can see the relationships between these animals and eventually lead in to learning about the diversity of life in different habitats, and eventually different animal adaptations! 

Wow, same here. There are many interesting ideas here. Thanks for sharing them. 

Wow, same here. There are many interesting ideas here. Thanks for sharing them. 

Wow, same here. There are many interesting ideas here. Thanks for sharing them. 

I had my students go outside and draw a picture of the sky for our weather unit! 

Some outdoor science activities that I have done with 1st and 2nd graders are taking a walk in our neighborhood forest and collect different leaves and bring them back to do leaf rubbings, you can do this with different grasses and evasive plants as well. We have also gone on virtual forest walks. There are a ton online! They are cheaper and kids get a feel of forests around the world.  Good luck! and thanks for the discussion everyone!

The children must love using all of their senses as they walk through the natural area.  By visiting it at different times of the year they can observe seasonal changes whether large or small. 

Children love nothing more than to be outside, breathing the fresh air and looking at all of the wonderful beauty of mother nature. Collecting rocks is a fun way kids learn about rocks and minerals, plus it's like a little adventure for them to see who can find the most unique rock. Collecting bugs in a jar is also a fun thing for young students to do, it gives them a chance to study the bugs up close and personal through a glass jar. These activities can easily be made into a game by turning it into a form of competition, who collects the shiniest rocks, who collects the biggest bug, etc...

Children love nothing more than to be outside, breathing the fresh air and looking at all of the wonderful beauty of mother nature. Collecting rocks is a fun way kids learn about rocks and minerals, plus it's like a little adventure for them to see who can find the most unique rock. Collecting bugs in a jar is also a fun thing for young students to do, it gives them a chance to study the bugs up close and personal through a glass jar. These activities can easily be made into a game by turning it into a form of competition, who collects the shiniest rocks, who collects the biggest bug, etc...

I always find great recourses from the scholastic web page. Some of these may be useful too you.  http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/lesson-plan/taking-science-outside-summer-activities-young-students

One activity that I enjoyed doing in Biology was an experiment with camouflage. It included different colored toothpicks and we acted as the predators. There were red, blue, yellow, and green toothpicks with about 20 of each color. We had to grab the first 20 we saw and each time, the 20 we grabbed were knocked out of the experiment in the end showing that those who blend in more with the environment (green in grass or yellow in yellow leaves during the fall) tend to not get eaten by the predator as much as those who stand out. It was a pain trying to pick up all of those toothpicks in the end but it was interesting. This was done in my college Bilogy course but could easily be changed to fit for a lower grade level. 

Have students color with a crayon on paper over leaves to show what the leaves look like. It's fun and engaging. 

These are all such great and fun ideas!

Thank you for your post! So many great and educational ideas were provided. I think my favorite and I would really like to include this in my future classroom is the gardening idea. I know it may be hard to get an area to garden at a school but I have seen many vertical garden ideas that I believe will be easy to add to a classroom. The garden can include plants that are edilble to also teach students about nutrition!  

Something that can be fun is putting kids into small groups to explore all the critters that they can spot. They can draw pictures of all the things they can find from little bugs to birds or squirrels. There can be a discussion at one point either before or after of the insects and animals that are commonly found where you live.

Any tips for a pre-service teacher on advocating for outside science activities in a traditional school? That's an aspect of teaching i haven't really seen or heard much about in my schooling.

For our youngest learners a weather walk would be a fun, interactive activity. Students could go out at the same time everyday to observe the sky, the clouds, and the temperature. Then once returning back to the classroom, you could conduct a classroom discussion about their observations. On large chart paper you could classify and record the weather patterns each day and begin to chart or graph each day.

I have a couple ideas on getting students engaged in outdoor activities! The first activity I thought would be fun would be a simple nature hike. A nature hike gives students the chance to get some physical activity while also observing examples of science within the nature around them.  To integrate ELA, after the hike you could have students write about their hike, what they enjoyed, and what they learned/noticed along their nature walk.  Another activity would be to facilitate a scavenger hunt.  This can be done many different ways.  The scavenger hunt could be based on finding things in nature/outdoors from a list provided to them, find and list 5 new things, or they could have a 5 senses scavenger hunt.  An outdoor activity involving the 5 senses would have to not include taste for obvious reasons.  This would include providing students with clipboards and pencils.  The students would also be given a chart or paper that they would write down their findings. On their paper, the student would describe what their outdoor object looks like, how it feels, how it smells, and if it makes a sound.  To incorpoarte art, the students could draw an illustration of what their outdoor object looked like. Kids love being able to explore and lead their own learning experiences.  These are just a few ideas on how to get them outside and engaged in learning activities!  I hope these ideas are helpful!

I think a really fun and educational outdoor activity for kids to do is an activity that I used to do in the fall season when I was younger. I did this at school once and then I continued to do it at home after that. The activity is to go outside and collect different types and colors of leaves that have fallen in the fall. After students collect their variation of leaves, you could go back outside and finish the activity or stay outside if you wish. From those leaves students could create collages by gluing the leaves to paper, cardboard, etc, while learning about why l leaves change color in during the fall. This activity is a way to get kids outdoors while also being educational and also incorporating art into the lesson. I think this activity is especially fun and interesting again, because after I did it as an elementary schooler I went home and would do it on my own. 

There are so many fun and engaging activities, across subject areas, that students can do outside. Students can use chalk to solve math problems, or the teacher can write math problems with chalk ahead of time, creating stations where students solve the problem, and move to the next. This involves movement, which is much more engaging than completing another math worksheet. In regards to science, students can take a nature walk to collect items such as leaves, rocks, and grass. Magnifying glasses can be used during the nature walk, or in the classroom, so students can examine the materials they found in nature. As a kindergarten classroom volunteer, I saw how students enjoyed reading books outside much more than reading books at their desks. I remember how much I enjoyed reading outside during April Reading Month as an elementary school student.

Hello! I love to get my students outdoors as much as possible. I like to incorporate brain breaks and have them run outside for a couple minutes to get them refocused. I also like to bring my lessons outside, especially if it is tied to a the current standard I am teaching. I have done a bit of research on taking lessons outdoors just to give the students a fresh scenery; it helps to bring them more into the lesson as well as giving them a bit of time to explore nature on their own and make their own discoveries.

Great things to do outside, is exploring the trees/plants/grass/etc that are around them. Also trying to incorporate exercise while exploring the environment around them outside the school. You can say everyone find a certain kind of leaf, and make them skip or jog on their way to do it. Being outside exploring and exercising is always great for students. 

Great things to do outside, is exploring the trees/plants/grass/etc that are around them. Also trying to incorporate exercise while exploring the environment around them outside the school. You can say everyone find a certain kind of leaf, and make them skip or jog on their way to do it. Being outside exploring and exercising is always great for students. 

One idea for an outdoor activity is have the students find a leaf and take a piece of paper and crayon and color over top of the leaf. This will help them observe the leaf. Another idea for an outdoor activity would be to have the students dig in the dirt and have the students observe that habitat. A third activity would be to have the students plant a seed and have them set it outside. Then every other day have the students record their observations.

We had students collect bugs at home and bring them to school to show their friends and we created a 'bug board.' Now students like to bring in cool bugs for fun, we look at them for a while, talk about them, and then they love to set them free outside. 

Hi,Jessica. I think You can take the children outside to blow bubbles and lead them to observe the formation of bubbles, the shape of bubbles, and the color of bubbles reflected by light. Children should love this science game.

One time in a science class, we went outside with magnifying glasses and looked around for bugs and wrote our observations. Kind of time consuming, but a lot of fun!

You can take them outside to explore and find different leaves. Then bring them inside and discuss the leaves they found, have them find someone with a similar leaf, or even draw their favorite leaf they found.