the blog: on education outside

Teaching Prep Outside.
Getting Started

Teaching Prep Outside

My role as a teacher is always evolving. Over the past 25 years, I’ve taught just about every grade in public elementary schools across two

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Easy lavender playdough
Loose Parts

Easy Lavender Playdough

Playdough is surprisingly entertaining for kids of all ages. Adding lavender playdough as a sensorial play opportunity in the school garden becomes a delightful way

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How to Start Seeds in Paper Pots

There are hundreds of adorable examples of how to start seeds in eggshells and toilet paper rolls floating around on the internet. Pinterest has entire boards devoted to the subject and, as a consumer of all things gardening with kids, I’ve tried most of them. To save you the frustration

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Risky Play with Height: Life Lessons Last a Lifetime

Risky play with height includes climbing, jumping from or swinging over heights, hanging, dangling, or dropping from heights, as well as balancing over any variety of heights. The known risk of physical injury from risky play with height is from falling. Local knowledge, and a risk benefit assessment, can reduce

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Teaching Prep Outside.

Teaching Prep Outside

My role as a teacher is always evolving. Over the past 25 years, I’ve taught just about every grade in public elementary schools across two provinces. For the past seven years my role has been teaching prep outside. This position emerged through an innovative re-think of how we allocate prep

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School Garden Soil Resources

This post is the second in a series of posts with resources for teachers teaching across the curriculum in their school gardens. This post lists some of the resources shared on the topic of soil science in school gardens from session two of the garden classroom series. If you are

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School Garden Weed Resources

This post is one of a series of posts listing resources available to teachers seeking tools for teaching across the curriculum in their school gardens. This post lists some of the resources shared on the topic of weed management in school gardens from session one of the garden classroom series.

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Play Research Group: Children As Catalysts for Social Capital

During our final August PLAY Journal group meeting, we reviewed the article “Through the Kids . . . We Connected With Our Community”: Children as Catalysts of Social Capital (Wood et al., 2011) and discussed the social implications of demographic shifts in urban communities. Social Capital Social capital, defined by

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Play Research Group: Risky Play In Schools

For our July 25 play research study group meeting, I presented slides from a presentation given at a recent Canadian Association of School System Administrators (CASSA 2019) conference sharing what opportunities for risky play in schools can look like across the province of BC. It was a conversational hour with

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Best Books Supporting Loose Parts Play Outdoors

Loose parts are found or natural objects that have no specific instructions for play and are highly valued for their imaginative and creative affordances for play. For children who are new to loose parts play outdoors, it can help to introduce them in small quantities. I have found that for

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Easy lavender playdough

Easy Lavender Playdough

Playdough is surprisingly entertaining for kids of all ages. Adding lavender playdough as a sensorial play opportunity in the school garden becomes a delightful way to integrate student learning and core competency skill development with the natural world.  This simple play staple engages children in imaginative play while increasing communication,

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