Learning outside the classroom

 

WORKING OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM can include working in outdoor environments, field trips, museums, or galleries. 

Even the environment just outside your classroom is rich with possibilities, yielding choice and agency to your students as they strengthen their skills for selecting, rejecting, having a go, resilience and open-mindedness.

Dillon et al. (2007) speculate that the different ownership of the space might contribute positively, as they found that teachers felt ownership of their indoor school space, whereas outdoors both time and space were considered to be more owned by the students.

Therefore, taking students out of school or their classroom can increase their creative skills (Borradaile,
2006; Burgess & Addison, 2007; Dillon, Craft, Best, Rigby, & Simms, 2007; Kendall, Muirfield, White, & Wilkin, 2007; Rutland & Barlex, 2008, cited in Davies et al., 2013).

These are a few simple but highly effective examples I have used, that you might like to try too:

1. Y3 - My Korowai Cloak - Looking for 'plants' texture: 

ART LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

For this art lesson, students went seeking out textures to add extra depth to their artwork designs. This was found outside the classroom in the concrete, wooden boxing around flowerbeds, metal manhole covers, wall claddings etc. Students had earlier composed a New Zealand 'bush' scene using simple, stylised shapes for their plants like Cabbage Trees, Flax and Nikau (palm),  then went in search of rubbings in nature to add texture to these shapes using suitable wax crayon colours. Once back in the room, students painting in these drawings with analogous colours using water based paints (like dye or liquid water colours)

 

 

 

 

2. Y4 - Introduction to the Element of Texture -  conceptual understandings  

ART LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

To introduce the Elements of Art, we conducted a mini inquiry into each element. 

For TEXTURE we used photocopier paper folded into smaller segments and a range of wax crayon colours, then went for a walk around the school to collect a range of rubbings before returning to class. Here we had a go at drawing our favourites with markers, learning ways to represent texture in 2D on flat artwork. Later, these designs influenced the patterns students used in their TEXTURE informed artworks 

 

 

3. Y3 - Exploration inquiry - walk around the school

 

To help students understand the concept of being an alien in a foreign land,  I asked them to think back to when they first started school and how everything was so foreign to them.

We went outside and returned to their first year classrooms and playgrounds, where they took photos of the areas that brought back fond memories. (We have classroom iPad sets so students worked in groups of 3 to take their photos.)

Next we visited the senior part of the school and asked then to photograph areas that they were looking forward to exploring in the future. After returning to class, students reviewed their photographs and deleted all but their 2 personal favourites, which I printed as the inspiration for their individual artworks you can see here.

4. Y4-6 Photography

Camera LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

iPad LESSON PLAN AVAILABLE HERE

 

I regularly teach photography as an after school elective. I have used both school supplied classroom cameras (simple point 'n shoot models) that I have borrowed from across the school, and more recently with iPads. In each lesson, I introduce a new focus and then students go on a walk around the school to capture images that meet those requirements. Since iPads, students now also have the opportunity to play with the editing tools once back in class.

And finally, some of the simplest but most effect lessons have been to simply go outside and observe nature. For example:

• The sky (blue colour) comes all the way down to earth. Most younger students typically colour a blue strip across the top of their drawings to represent the sky as they have not yet grasped the concept of the horizon line. 
• Tree trunks have texture and a variety of colour. Some tree trunks also split into branches while some don't.
• Leaves come in a vast variety of shapes and colours. As do flowers.
• The tops of doors and windows are usually at the same height at ground level. They also have frames that hold the glass. 
• Things further away appear smaller - even big things. A pathway appears to converge in the distance.

There are a hundred great learning opportunities to be had outside the classroom. I hope you will also take your students outside during the fine weather to observe and learn in a new way. Even if it's just to enjoy a class novel under a tree while listening to the birds sing in the trees.

Thank you for stopping by today. Would love to read your ideas on this theme below in the comments. Come and  connect with me by clicking on the links below to follow along 👇

With love, Te Aroha 

Timea

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