There’s Really No Excuse For Avoiding Active Outdoor Learning
"It's raining, and blustery, plus I don't have the time or resources." Bryn Llewellyn explains why you really don't need much to take learning outside, and why it's imperative for children's health you do it
Have you ever made the mistake of sitting in the first few rows at a live comedy event? That moment when the comedian starts talking with certain members of the audience and you dread being ‘picked on’ next. This happened to me during a show by the irrepressible Ross Noble in Leeds.
When he asked my friend, a nursery nurse, if she had any fat kids in her school, he then proceeded to reveal his win:win solution – ‘Get some rope and tie them to the kids with ADHD’.
Funnily enough, this extreme course of action does not feature in the Department for Health’s recently updated publication, Childhood Obesity: a Plan of Action. But then, there’s a lot that’s not in it.
Considering the subject matter, this is a surprisingly thin document, and it has come under fire from professors and celebrity chefs alike for not going far enough.
One of the recommendations states: ‘Every primary school child should get at least 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day. At least 30 minutes should be delivered in school every day through active break times, PE, extracurricular clubs, active lessons, or other sport and physical activity events, with the remaining 30 minutes supported by parents and carers outside of school time.’
With this in mind, Dan King posed a question to teachers on Twitter’s primary-focused Edchat, #PrimaryRocks (@PrimaryRocks1) on 23 January:
“What prevents you from making as many lessons as possible physically active?”
There followed an interesting exchange with many great ideas, suggestions and signposting – in essence, the rationale behind these hugely successful weekly informal CPD chats.
However, what concerned Dan and me was the number of teachers with perceived barriers for not engaging in active learning across the curriculum. These included:
• The weather • Poor behaviour • Curriculum constraints • Time • Resources
Excuse 1: The weather
Agreed, in parts of the UK it can be rather shabby at times, but the adage, ‘There’s no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing’, comes to mind.
But despite the weather, I firmly believe that children need to get outside, where they can be curious and explore, work collaboratively and learn about the environment, through the environment; ultimately developing a respect for the environment.
Excuse 2: Behaviour
As to poor behaviour being cited as a barrier, this brings to mind the time during my teacher training at a junior school in Newcastle when I asked staff about the influences on behaviour. As a naive newbie I thought I would be regaled with theories about socioeconomic factors and ‘nature vs nurture’. Instead, I was somewhat taken aback when over 90% of the teachers questioned said, “The wind!” (tying in nicely to excuse 1).
So, yes, along the way there may be some different behavioural issues outside compared to the confined space of the classroom, but how are we to promote conflict resolution without having conflict in the first place? With patience and the right strategies, learning behaviours thrive outdoors.
Excuse 3: Curriculum constraints
We all want high standards, and leadership teams work relentlessly to ensure that children make academic progress, however there is a growing body of evidence to suggest that sitting down is not necessarily the best way we learn.
This was evidenced when I co-delivered an active learning session with a primary teacher in Durham. Referring to one boy working as part of a group, the teacher said: “I didn’t know he could do that; he’s never written it in his maths book or shown me in a maths lesson.”
Raising standards and being active are far from being mutually exclusive, as highlighted in the pioneering research at Leeds Beckett University. One success of an active mathematics session during this research was clearly evidenced by a Year 5 child at Westerton Primary School who said: “That was great. You don’t get a chance to zone out with active maths.”
Excuses 4 and 5: Time and resources
We are facing huge cutbacks in education, and leadership teams are having to face serious dilemmas about staffing costs, buying resources and bringing in outside organisations. However, with a bit of nous, creative teachers can turn learning objectives into genuine active learning experiences.
Take for example a recent session at Queensway Primary School in Leeds, where the children were equipped with 30cm rulers, taken into the school grounds and asked to find objects that measured 10/20/30/60cm.
There was no photocopying needed, just a clear instruction, and away went the children, working in pairs or small groups, engaged in discussion of the possibilities and moving from one place to another.
Having read the tweets during the #PrimaryRocks Edchat, it would seem that the major barrier to engaging teachers in active learning involves confidence. Without a doubt, Initial Teacher Training programmes need greater consistency if we are to have teachers prepared to consider alternative ways to learn, rather than learning while sitting down.
The proposed Sugar Tax should lead to more money made available to schools as part of the Primary PE & Sports Premium Funding. However, it is imperative that leadership teams consider how best to spend this money. There are many companies more than happy to provide schools with coaches to deliver PE sessions. However, many of these schemes are not upskilling teachers, either because the coaches are only qualified in certain sports or because these sessions are merely used to release teachers for PPA.
The Child Obesity: Plan of Action may be flawed, but it is a start – especially with the promise of increased funding for schools. However, we need to look at real solutions based on scientific evidence that provide meaningful impact.
Over the next term, I will share school-based programmes that are showing real promise into the impact of active learning.
Bryn Llewellyn, according to a Key Stage 2 pupil at Oakdale Junior School in London, is ‘a genius’. However, his friends and family know the truth. Having worked in various UK schools for 25 years as a teacher, deputy head and acting head he became increasingly frustrated over time that outside agencies were putting undue pressure on teachers and learners, and that certain subjects were being pushed to one side. Bryn therefore decided to create educational resources that develop confidence in key areas of the curriculum through physical activity, and founded Tagtiv8 Active Learning Games in 2012.
