A Young Teacher's Guide To Outdoor Lessons

Students, at all levels of schooling, can often react positively to lessons given away from the classroom environment. They see that the lesson may have more relevance to life than one in the classroom. These are good reasons to attempt an outdoor lesson.
This article summarises what a teacher needs to consider before embarking on an outdoor lesson; how to prepare for one; some general ideas about the lesson; what students need; ideas about the follow up and some teaching advice.
Ask yourself these questions before you decide to have an outdoor lesson.

• Will an outdoor lesson achieve your learning goals as well as or better than the same lesson given in the classroom?
• Can an 'around the school' activity replace the need for an excursion outside the school?
• Are there any expenses involved? (Work out a budget. Make sure your budget has an extra amount for unforeseen expenses. You can always refund money later but it's hard to get money after the event.)
• Group work? Yes/no. If yes? How do you organise these groups? How big should they be?
• What is the best time to be outside?
• Do you need permission to run the activity from the principal or education authority?
• Do you need parental permission?
• Do you need to make special arrangements for the medical conditions or physical disabilities of some students?
• Do you require a teacher aide and/or parent support? How do you get that?
• Do you plan a wet weather alternative?
• Do you need to make arrangements for lunch, toilet facilities and places to access drinking water?

Preparation:

• Plan thoroughly. Have a detailed written plan of what you need to do to prepare the outdoor lesson.
• Go to the area you plan to use and test out what you want to do.
• Create a simple worksheet for the students to answer questions or gather data.
• Make a list of any equipment you need. (Do stock takes before and after).
• Have rules for the class to work outside. (Act safely and always be visible to the teacher are key rules to include.)
• Pre-teaching is essential to get the most out of the activity.
• For the students to take the outdoor lesson seriously (particularly in high school classes) there needs to be an assessment task or report attached to the lesson.
• Practise the assessment procedure with your class before you use it.
• Decide on marking criteria.
• Decide beforehand what penalty you will have for using wrong data in the assessment task but using the correct procedures with that data to obtain correctly calculated results from that data.
• Give a simple version of the lesson plan with instructions to students. This could be part of their worksheet.

The lesson:

• Don't try to do too much.
• Have a quiet signal so you can give more advice or instructions. (Hand up or a whistle.)
• Have a gathering place to start and end the lesson.
• Have a regrouping/assembly signal for more instructions or to move on to the next venue.
• Remind the students of the rules for the class to work outside. (Act safely and always be visible to the teacher are key rules to include).
• Have serious penalties for students breaking the rules.

The students need:

• Hats, sunscreen, water, shoes, clothes and
• Clipboard, pencil, eraser, paper, worksheet.

Advice:

• Speaking to the class outdoors can be difficult. Give detailed instructions beforehand in the classroom.
• Select a gathering place that makes it easier for you to speak to the class in an outdoor setting.
• Be careful to ensure your class is quiet in venues outside other classrooms so as not to disturb other classes.
• Don't forget to mark the roll at the beginning and end of the period.
• Randomly check and count the number of students you can see often during the activity to make sure everyone is on task and are where you can see them.

Follow-up:

• Follow-up in class is essential with a discussion on what was learnt. This may be written work to consolidate that learning.
• The alternative, particularly in high school, would be an assessment task. This must have value in your reporting system or it may not be treated seriously.
• It is important to note here that there will be some high school classes that will treat this lesson seriously. Therefore, there may be no need to apply an assessment task to encourage learning. Individual teachers will know when this can occur.
• Do an evaluation on what you did for future planning of the same activity.
• Collect worksheets and mark and return for further follow up.
• Use what you have learnt from the worksheets/assessment tasks to reteach any problem areas in the students' learning.

Initially, you might put an outdoor lesson in the 'too hard basket'. However, once you give it a try, you will find out that these lessons can be useful and can enhance learning. Be sure to teach a lesson that will benefit from an outdoor setting. If you are not sure, give it 'a go' anyway on a lesson topic that is easy to 'rescue' in the classroom if it is not a success outside.