On #internationalplayday, we launched the compendium of outdoor activities from the Erasmus+ project G.R.O.W. – Grow our world inside out, which for two years promoted a wide range of initiatives to make outdoor learning effective at the Hortênsia Diogo Correia Primary School in S. Pedro do Estoril. A community was born in a walled school, a naturalised space was created in a vacant lot made of reeds, and this manual was written there, a sample to encourage more teachers and educators to leave the four walls and teach the curriculum outside. It is also an invitation to partners in extra-curricular activities to break the mould and join forces with Nature. This compendium is the final outcome of the project.
A huge thank you: To ‘our’ school – to the management of the Alapraia group, to all the teaching and non teaching staff – for accepting the challenge; Our partners at Sint Paulus’s school Cedric Ryckaert and Johan Vanhouwaert for all the inspiration, best practices and support; To Cascais Municipality for sharing the vision of the importance of playing and learning with nature; IAC – Child Support Institute for taking on the essential task of evaluating the project, which resulted in a 95% rating by the National Erasmus agency; To a group of wonderful people without whom none of this would have been possible: Leonor Pego, for translating the curriculum like no one else into the best classroom, nature; Ana Almada, Ivone Bello, Liliana Melo, Magda Morbey Ferro, Patricia Junqueira, Patrícia Magro and Sónia Bernardo for coordinating the project with dedication and love, for children and nature.
You can read it ou download it for inspiration above and take your class outdoors!
( PT & ENG combined version)
Grow 