Empty Classroom day October 2017
What is Empty classroom day?
In 2011 in the UK, Anna Portch founded the grassroots ‘Empty Classroom Day’ campaign, with the support of teachers and educators at London Sustainable Schools Forum (LSSF). The campaign aimed to encourage London schools to learn outside and to celebrate all the great environmental education taking place. Growing from just a handful of schools in 2011, to over 600 in 2015. In 2016, almost half a million children took part across 51 countries.
Outdoor Classroom Day is a day to celebrate and inspire outdoor learning and play.
Why?
Outdoor learning improves children’s health, engages them with learning and leads to a greater connection with nature. Play not only teaches critical life skills such as resilience, teamwork and creativity, but is central to children’s enjoyment of childhood.
We have been actively involved with this project now for over a year, challenging our classes to work outside for two sessions through out the day.
So what did we all get up to for this empty classroom day?
Early Years sang '5 little fire fighters' and got dressed up to follow a fire fighter obstacle course, making their way to the squirty bottles to spray water on the pretend fire and saving the toys, they especially enjoyed pressing the 'big mak' to make a "nee nor" sound.
Class 1 dug for worms and searched for caterpillars, they also washed fruit and vegetables in science for the Hungry Caterpillar story.
Class 2's story was Percy the Park Keeper - the secret path, they had a story in the 'Hobbit House' and acted it out out using puppets and rope in the 'Sensory Maze'. In the afternoon they experimented making their own bubbles in the 'Splat Zone'.
Class 3 spent time in 'The Hive' looking for heavy and light things and enjoyed moving forwards and backwards on the scooter boards for their maths sessions.
Class 4 collected autumn leaves from the 'Discovery Park' to make a collage for their Autumn display and listened to the different sounds they could hear.
Class 5 went on a 'bear hunt' on the 'Discovery Park' and collected leaves to make their own hedgehogs.
Class 6 are learning all about healthy living, they were very busy doing some data handling, making a pie-chart about which areas of the school they like to spend tine in the most - the winner was the 'Discovery Park'. They also had a 'bootcamp' doing different exercises such as star jumps, hoola hooping and skipping.
Class 7 Collected materials to make the three little pig houses. They also explored making their own bubbles and tested for the best solution and found 'washing up liquid, glycerine and water' worked the best.
Class 8 did some numeracy, rolling the dice and collecting the correct amount of objects from the 'Discovery Park' and also used leaves to make hedgehogs.
Class 9 had their Educational Visit on the morning and visited the Hancock museum. On the afternoon they spent time in the garden doing a 'room on the broom' and a 'shape' treasure hunt, using sticks to make the shapes.
Class 10's story was 'Funny Bones' they collected twigs and branches to make skeletons and measured different objects to see which were longer and shorter.
Lots of fun!
