As you go through the transition from summer to winter, there are so many things you can do to help the children in your school. One that is often overlooked, when compared to spring and summer activities, is that you can still have the kids spend quality outdoor time by assisting them to fully utilise the playground. Autumn is a great time that brings out the beauty of outdoor spaces. You can use playground equipment together with outdoor sensory equipment to get the children to encounter many sensory experiences, with many offered by this wondrous season.
If you have a playground at your school, there are a number of cross-curricular activities your children can enjoy in these spaces. You might even be able to cover the seven areas of learning required for the Early Years Foundation Stage. As you make lesson plans, you can use some of the ideas below. These are just a few great ideas to help your kids get the best out of a playground area this Autumn:
Physical Education and Physical Development Activities for Autumn
Autumn allows us to enjoy some fantastic outdoor walks, you can just pick a coat and go out for a walk, there is so much to see while you exercise. As for your children, you can help them to play games that encourage physical activity. Take for instance a scavenger hunt. Autumn environments are appealing and kids will enjoy running around looking for Autumn treasures. This a great idea to have them get their exercise, since they won’t even realise the exertion as they enjoy playing so much.
This allows them to develop physically while enjoying themselves. You could have children go back and forth from your main playground area, even combine the hunt with some play time on swings or climbing frames. Sometimes, if your playground is situated near trees, it can be a helpful idea to have children gather and clear away leaves as part of the game.
You can also guide your children to use the playground equipment you have at school to play a range of games.
One ideal game the kids can play is pretending to be any of the Autumn animals. Trim Trails and Climbing Frames are perfect for children who want to pretend to be busy animals like the squirrels. Assist the kids to move, jump, swing and climb across the Trim Trail like balancing squirrels, carrying acorns or nuts from one end to the other.
If you want to increase fun, and learning, you can build teams for the children to compete with each other in the gathering, carrying and storing of most acorns. You can even acquire Den Making equipment for an autumn building task. These help with both educational and physical benefits. Kids can learn about animals that hibernate as they exercise. You can make it a competition for children to navigate the school grounds as they look for leaves and twigs and other suitable materials to build different animal habitats.
Expressive Arts and Design
While you let kids walk around the school playground, they get to see an array of Autumn colours and textures as well as various natural scenes. Sometimes you might not have ideal environments for such walks. Creative Play UK offers sensory garden items which are great for creating environments with engaging surroundings.
You can acquire different types of planters and plant various plants, which in this season will give an appearance of Autumn tones. There are playboards with different types of animals which you can add into certain spaces in the playground for various effect. Creative Play also offer materials that can be used during physical education lessons or break time. You could also get crayons and boards children can draw with. They could lie on leaves in the Autumn and draw the current environment.
Mathematics and Numeracy in Autumn
Your playground offers an ideal space where kids can be involved in gathering, counting, recording and creating charts. This can help even the very young kids to learn statistics, collecting skills, presentation to the group, analysis of colours and patterns, and interpretation of the environment. They can gather acorns, cones and leaves that come in different sizes and shapes.
Children can learn many mathematical concepts like weight, quantity, shape, sizes as they collect and measure things dropped by trees and plants during Autumn. You only need to get them the right equipment and guide them to utilise the school playground and children will do the rest as they learn and understand the world around them as they socialise together.
For more on our range of outdoor playground equipment items, many of which are designed to be used throughout the year and enjoyed in autumn as much as any other season, you can contact us by phone 01244 375627 or email [email protected], or explore the collections here on our site.