"Studies show that outdoor learning delivers many benefits - reducing stress, improving moods, boosting concentration, and increasing a child's engagement at school."

-Gwen Dewar, Ph.D.

On Wednesday, September 18th, students in Room 12 were invited to spend time outside in the school field enjoying the brilliant afternoon sunshine! The purpose of our time outdoors was to participate in Take Me Outside Day. Take Me Outside Day is about simply making time to head outside to learn beyond the four walls of a classroom. In addition to this, it helps to raise awareness about outdoor learning by encouraging educators to take their learners outside.

This year, students were asked to celebrate this special event by creating beautiful art with the natural world. We used Andy Goldsworthy-inspired photos of nature art to help us gather ideas and to think creatively about different nature art possibilities. Next, we spent time unpacking our learning intentions that directly connect to the New LearnAlberta curriculum.

Physical Education & Wellness Curriculum:
How can teamwork support positive interactions?
- By engaging in positive interactions that support teamwork

Knowing that engaging with nature and making art have many proven benefits, students headed outside to make their own version of nature art with found and foraged materials. Students were invited to work together as a team to create a temporary art piece in the school field. Before ending our afternoon outside, Mrs. Swan took photographs of each art piece and she submitted them to the Take Me Outside Day team. The Take Me Outside Day team will then work to collect all of the submitted photographs of nature art to create a giant national mosaic! We are looking forward to seeing the final product.

If time permits, over the next little while, please talk to your child using some of the following sentence prompts...

Take Me Outside Day Snaps...