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The Spirit of the Child

An exciting Primary School programme exploring outdoor learning and creative spaces

Starts: 2008-02-13
Finishes: 2008-04-18

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Introduction

The Spirit of the Child project was developed through Creative Partnerships during the 2006/7 academic year. It is an example of a bespoke action research project that Women & Theatre developed in partnership with a school, with a view to informing and impacting on long term practice.

Chad Vale Primary School and Women & Theatre were interested in exploring the ethos and ideas around Forest Schools, outdoor teaching and learning, and ‘the environment as a third teacher’. We particularly wanted to explore the benefits of being outdoors to health & wellbeing and engagement.

We felt working outdoors in an inclusive child-centred way could impact on children’s appreciation of their individuality and creativity. We wanted to explore this further and link in with the Healthy Schools Standard and Every Child Matters.
As an action research project, we decided to focus a lot of the activity with the year one class to allow more focussed observation and monitoring, before rolling out some of the outdoor work to the whole school.

The project aimed:

• To create and use outdoor spaces for teaching & learning
• To support the development of children’s social & emotional literacy
• To explore the effectiveness of delivering some of the year one curriculum outdoors
• To support each teacher delivering at least one 1-hour lesson outside by the end of Summer Term
• To develop an ethos for outdoor teaching

History

Research Phase:
During the initial exploratory phase, Jill Norman (W&T) and Bruce Warland (Chad Vale) investigated the philosophies of forest schools and outdoor learning to find a starting point for how this might work at Chad Vale. They soon realised that to take learning outdoors at Chad Vale, we would need to consider practical issues such as clothing and equipment, but also teachers’ personal feelings and comfort zones. We decided to hold an INSET session to gather staff opinions about outdoor working, to inform the prject’s development and increase staff support in the later roll out stages.

Initial Outdoor Work:
We wanted the project to have a theatrical basis, so decied to create three characters to facilitate the school’s engagement with the outdoors. Through a devising process, the idea of ‘The Bobs’ was conceived: three ‘outdoor’ characters, all called Bob. They were comic, eccentric, suit-wearing researchers and experimenters that had been sent from ‘The Centre of Research in to Outdoor Living and Learning’ (CROLL) to gather research from Chad Vale. Working closely with Bruce and drawing upon our Forest Schools research, the team planned a model of working for a pilot week of outdoor activities with staff and pupils.
The ‘Bobs’ set up a camp at the school in an area at the back of the playing fields to give the impression that the ‘outdoor people’ were living there. Activities included an outdoor assembly with the whole school, some intensive work with year one delivering their curriculum outdoors and a short session with every other class – making and throwing seed bombs, which we hoped would take root by the spring.

Year One Activity:
The next phase involved Bruce teaching weekly outdoor lessons with his year one class, covering different curriculum areas including: Geography (How can we make our local area safer,) History (Homes,) Art (Exploring materials,) Maths (Shape, Space and Measure) and Design Technology (Building Homes.) Pupils wrote short email reports for The Bobs at the end of each class, and the bobs replied to emails, and in response to a particular lesson report, even made a short film about road safety which fed directly into a project the class were working on.

During this phase, Class 1 also had a visit to the forest site at College High School where there is a young but sizeable forested area. The day was hosted by and with Nick Wale – a Birmingham Forest Schools Co-ordinator. The Bobs were visiting too – what a coincidence! During the day, the class made both small animal shelters and developed larger shelters for themselves.

Whole School Roll out
Further INSET sessions then took place to convey project findings to date and support a roll out of activity so that all staff would deliver some work outside. We constructed a temporary shelter to maximise conditions for the whole school roll out, whilst leaving room for teachers and pupils to complete elements of it – to ensure whole school ownership.

At the beginning of June, the Bobs returned to Chad Vale for another week, to provide a catalyst for teachers to pursue their task of delivering a lesson outside. The Bobs were also accessible for teachers to consult them in their planning. A lot of the activities were inspired by Class 1’s Forest Trip including the creation of a ‘wishing gate’ through which everyone has to go through in order to enter the ‘outdoor learning area.’ The children also designed and made different things to decorate or supplement the ‘outdoor learning area’ which yielded a range of additions to the space including benches, signs and shelves. Many decorations were made using found objects including sycamore helicopters threaded onto cotton and gathered stones which were painted. Engagement with the different activities was very child led, allowing them the flexibility to try different things and move from activity to activity when they chose to.

After the Bobs visit, the area continued to be a source of interest and all the teachers used the area for subsequent lessons and the children’s enthusiasm for outdoor learning continued. Class 2 were inspired by class 1’s outdoor learning diary and completed one of their own including, science and literacy lessons. Class 6 continued the work that the Bobs had begun by regularly adding to the learning area with more benches and developing the mini-beast and log pile area.

Notes

The Bobs are fascinating characters that really appeal to children, The project has a big impact on whole school communities as no one can fail to notice that there are people living and working in the playground in all kinds of weathers.
Janice Connolly, W&T Artistic Director

Outcome

The project was very successful and we found that given the right conditions, there was a real enthusiasm for outdoor working amongst teachers and pupils.

We also found that the outdoor activities had a huge impact on children’s engagement and achievement levels. It provided children with a more varied experience of learning and one which they could take more ownership of. The outdoor activities developed different skills including practical skills and team work, as well as appeal to different types of ‘learner’.

The delivery of the project and its success is a credit to the open-mindedness of the staff and children at Chad Vale and their keenness to work in new and original ways. It was also underpinned by the consultative and collaborative process used throughout the project which ensured whole school ownership.

The findings of the project highlighted a range of opportunities open to the school for continuing this work, which they are now considering. The school could develop the outdoor learning area into a permanent structure – now that the pilot project has proved a need for such a space.

Production Credits

Researched & devised by: Jill Norman, Michael Crouch, Liam Walsh & Bruce Warland

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