Outdoor Learning – Learning for Sustainability

Apply for Outdoor Learning Grant Funding

This list of grants (see link below) has been compiled by Creative STAR Learning Company to aid schools, youth groups, the environmental, outdoor and play sectors with finding funding for a range of outdoor ventures and initiatives. We hope you will find it of value. If you are able to send us any other relevant funding sources, then please let us know and we will add it to the list. We aim to up-date this sheet every six months. Many thanks, Juliet Robertson and Lesley McLaren www.creativestarlearning.co.uk

creative-star-learning-company-lfs-grant-information

British Council: LfS Connecting Classrooms Course

Glasgow: 14 January – 18 March (Venue TBC)

Edinburgh: 21 January – 25 March 2017 Moray House School of Education, University of Edinburgh
Oban: 22 April – 25 June 2017 (bookings not yet open, please register interest)

This professional learning initiative by the University of Edinburgh in partnership with the British Council and Learning for Sustainability Scotland, is a timely opportunity for teachers to grapple with what Learning for Sustainability means, what existing and new skills and knowledge are required, and how this might all look in the your school context. Connecting directly with Curriculum for Excellence, involvement will enable you to effectively plan for and implement Learning for Sustainability approaches in your school.

This programme offers teachers the opportunity to engage and collaborate over a ten week period which includes two full day face to face sessions at the beginning and at the end of the period, supported by fortnightly inputs from online materials.

Teachers who successfully complete the programme will be eligible to apply for overseas study visits to partner schools in other countries. Learning can be used to strengthen international links at your school, enriching teaching and learning through partnerships and joint projects.

The professional learning is fully funded.

For more information on the Glasgow course, including what is involved and how to book please click HERE.

For more information on the Edinburgh course, including what is involved and how to book please click HERE.

If you would like to be included on the mailing list for future courses in other Scottish locations, please email Abi Cornwall.

Campaign for School Gardening Courses

Campaign for School Gardening Courses, Royal Horticultural Society
The RHS are running teacher training courses in Scotland this year, alongside their Campaign for School Gardening.

– A Year in your School Gardening Club, Edinburgh -28th Sept; Renfrewshire – 14th Oct
This course is full of fun projects and activities to help you keep your gardening club flourishing in all weathers and seasons throughout the year. Click here for more details.

– Apply Primary Level Maths and English skills through the Outdoor Environment, Edinburgh, 26th Oct
Have you ever thought about taking your pupils outside for maths and English lessons? Being in the school garden or a beautiful local green space will inspire your pupils to learn, enjoy and achieve in these subjects. Please click here.

– Cultivating a Healthier School (Grow, Cook and Eat your own produce), Glasgow, 21st Nov
RHS horticulturists have teamed up with Chefs @ School to provide a practical course to enable you to put pupils’ health and wellbeing at the centre of your school with an ethos and culture of great food. Please click here.

Gardening and Woodland Courses

Outdoor & Woodland Learning Scotland (OWL) Gardening and Woodland Courses OWL will be running a series of courses on Gardening for Biodiversity , which will include a practical introduction to the Wee Green Fingers resource. Dates and Venues:

– Saturday 15th October (morning) – Hidden Gardens, Glasgow.

– Saturday 12th November – The Bield, Perthshire.

– Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh, date tbc.

The courses will be free and open to all OWL members, teachers and educators. Please email to provisionally book a place: Bonnie.Maggio@forestry.gsi.gov.uk

Coming soon: 2 workshops on Scotland’s Native Woodlands. For more information subscribe to the OWL Scotland bulletin.

Game of Cones

We really need to encourage a new generation of plant health professionals. Just think what life would be like if the resources we get from plants like food, timber and medicine were to be in short supply. Trees in Britain provide us with some stark examples of plant health problems. Since the 1970’s a fungus called Dutch elm disease has killed between 25 and 75 million elms. Today it is still spreading in northern Scotland. Unfortunately, this is not an isolated example. The Forestry Commission website lists seven pests and 13 diseases that currently threaten British trees. The problem continues to grow and the rate at which new problems arrive has been accelerated through accidental import as a result of global trade. Recently there has been considerable media coverage of tree health problems, often with dire predictions for the future.

Rather than just wringing our hands we need to do something about this situation. This is why a group of Scottish researchers have taken the unusual step of working with a computer games company to develop CALEDON a survival strategy game about tree health. Their aim is to switch on the younger generation to tree health through the very popular medium of computer games. Any biologist will tell you that diversity of species and diversity of genes within species creates resilience. The old saying about the dangers of putting all your eggs in one basket is absolutely spot-on in the context of plant health. So why is it that our forestry practices have for so long focussed on single species plantations that are often of restricted genetic diversity?

This question is at the hearth of CALEDON which has been developed as part of the outreach and education programme of the PROTREE project http://bit.ly/2cAlyzN and has seen project scientists from seven Scottish research institutes working together. Designed to be an enjoyable game, inspired by the popularity of virtual worlds, CALEDON challenges players to keep a forest thriving under a series of different scenarios with different objectives that include tree species diversity and forest cover. Players choose what trees to plant and have to work within the limits of available funds. Income can be generated by tree felling and pest and diseases have to be contended with. The learning to develop an effective strategy in the game comes from prompts that appear during gameplay and from exploration of the games encyclopaedia.

CALEDON is aimed at early teens and has good links to the curriculum at Level 3 and 4, but experience has shown that much younger players enjoy the game and do understand how to develop successful strategy. Although it is a single player game small group discussion around how to keep the forest thriving is possible as the player is completely in control of the pace of the game and clicks a button to advance time by five years after making as many changes as they like or can afford to do. The game can be played online at www.rbge.ac.uk/caledon and can also be downloaded for offline play. An iPad version of the game is available at the App Store.

LfS and the Shieling Project

Before outdoor learning there was the shieling. For hundreds of years, each summer young people all over Scotland would take the livestock up to hill or moorland pastures, camping there in small bothies, learning about the world beyond the village. The Shieling Project brings the shieling back to life for young people and teachers, through outdoor learning, resources and professional learning for teachers.

Sam Harrison, who runs the Shieling Project explains “Through this tradition we can look at so many subjects across the curriculum, and work skills from archaeology to forestry, as well as exploring global sustainability themes through hands on local learning experiences.”

The Shieling Project professional learning programme in learning for sustainability will run again from this May. The year long course leads to professional recognition from the GTCS in Learning for Sustainability.

Based in Glen Strathfarrar, near Beauly, four weekend workshops, two days of outdoor learning with your class and an online forum provide an opportunity to build a critical, supportive and collaborative community. The course costs £900.

For more information, including a video of the first cohort of teachers presenting their learning journeys, click here.

For a full list of courses that can lead to professional recognition, visit the GTCS website .

School Grounds: Funding Opportunity

Are you keen to develop school grounds, community gardens or other community spaces? The Tesco Local Community Scheme now provides funding to support projects in school or nursery grounds – even those without public access. The fund is for 140 grants of £8,000, £10,000 or £12,000.

A brief expression of interest should be completed by Friday 11th December. The full application is due for submission by January 15th 2016.

The grants are funded from the money raised from the 5p bag charge in Tesco stores. The grant programme is administered by Groundwork, working with Greenspace Scotland.

Thanks to Grounds for Learning for sharing this exciting news.

Apply for extra places on LfS practitioner network

Additional places available for practitioners and leaders with a passion for LfS

Are you passionate about learning for sustainability (LfS)? Do you have experience of leading on one or more aspects of LfS in your educational setting? Are you willing to share what has worked for you and be inspired by other committed practitioners across Scotland?

Additional places have become available on the LfS national practitioner network. Offers of places have already been made through the LfS local authority network. However, if you have not registered an interest through your local authority and would like to be considered for one of the additional places, please email Anthony.Hutcheson@educationscotland.gsi.gov.uk .

The network will be convened by Education Scotland in partnership with the Forestry Commission Scotland. The first meeting took place on Friday 30^th October 2015. The second meeting will take place on Friday 11th December 2015. The third meeting has been arranged for Thursday 4th February 2016. Venues tbc.

Aims

The purpose of the network is to create time and space for a cross-authority group to:

share practice and successes
work in a coordinated way to identify gaps in the system and co-create new resources and approaches
disseminate these resources immediately to all practitioners through Glow
work in partnership with national LfS providers to build capacity in the system
share successes and impact through a range of digital platforms.

Person specification

To contribute effectively to the national network we are looking for individuals with skills and expertise across the following areas:

passionate about learning for sustainability
excellent knowledge of CfE and a range of LfS themes and approaches. These may include some or all of the following areas: global citizenship, sustainable development education, international education, outdoor learning and children’s rights
experience of leading and/or contributing to effective change, development and improvement in LfS at school/local and/or national level
proven track record of planning and delivering high quality learning experiences
ability to take a flexible, creative and collaborative approach to working with a range of other practitioners and partners
excellent written communication and IT skills to explain the values of sustainability to a range of audiences, while consistently reflecting upon and modelling those same values
awareness of emerging research and policy developments and how they relate to LfS
ability to disseminate resources, approaches and understanding to peers across their authority.

LfS at the SLF

There is still time to register for seminars at the Scottish Learning Festival 2015.

The Scottish Learning Festival (SLF) is the key education event in Scotland welcoming thousands of education professionals.

SLF 2015 takes place on Wednesday 23 and Thursday 24 September in the SECC, Glasgow.

Below are some of the key seminars relating to learning for sustainability. Remember that even if the seminars are showing up as full when you register, it can be worth trying to attend on the day, as spaces often become available.

Staff will also be on hand at the Education Scotland stand to discuss learning for sustainability between 3:00 and 3:30pm on Wed 23rd and 12:30 and 1:00pm on Thu 24th.

Wednesday 23rd September

Learning for Sustainability: National Progress, Local Success

Ian Menzies, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE B1E

Participation – collaborating with children and young people to raise attainment and achievement

Paul McWatt, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE A1B

Scotland Lights Up Malawi

Alastair Davidson, Keep Scotland Beautiful, SEMINAR CODE K3A

If You Go Down to the Woods – Developing Forest Kindergartens

Marian Cairns, Forestry Commission Scotland, SEMINAR CODE B2C

‘Joined up Thinking’. Using the John Muir Award

Phil Thompson, Ardroy Outdoor Education Centre, SEMINAR CODE A2E

Social Studies Resource Launch

Lynne Robertson, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE C2E

The Unexpected Outcomes of Youth Achievement Awards

Aileen McGovern, West Lothian Council, SEMINAR CODE C1E

Establishing and developing a successful link with France

Thomas Chaurin, Institut Français d’Écosse, SEMINAR CODE K3C

How do the Scottish Teacher Education Standards and the GTCS Code of Professionalism & Conduct set parameters for teacher professionalism in Scotland?

Tom Hamilton and Lindsay Thomson, GTCS, SEMINAR CODE L2D

Better Eating, Better Learning – practical ideas to put the guidance into practice

Lorna Aitken, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE C1B

Thursday 24th September

Working in tandem – using bicycles in the curriculum

Sustrans Scotland and Harestanes Primary School

SEMINAR CODE A1F

Think about it! Philosophy with children and young people

Joe Walker, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE M1F

Making it into Higher Education

Martin Davidson, The Outward Bound Trust, SEMINAR CODE A1G

PAS promoting education for all in the planning process

Julia Frost, PAS, SEMINAR CODE D2H

World War One Whole School Context – a collaborative approach

Jenny Watson, Middleton Park School, SEMINAR CODE N1H

Collaboration, shared self-evaluation and partnership with the third sector

Alona Murray, Education Scotland, SEMINAR CODE D1I

Making Rights Real: A Framework for Rights Based Learning

South Lanarkshire Council, Curriculum Quality Improvement Service, SEM CODE L2I

Embedding international education in school: A whole school approach to raising attainment

Lucy Young, British Council Scotland, SEMINAR CODE D2I

Air Quality Learning and Teaching Package

Ben Jackson, Scottish Environment Protection Agency, SEMINAR CODE M1I

‘Out to Play’ with Eco Drama

During a number of recent events and presentations about learning for sustainability, I have displayed the above word cloud with the question “Where do we start?”. Different practitioners offer different responses. My response is to assure everyone that where you start is far less important than actually getting started and making the connections between the many exciting areas of this agenda.

Making connections is exactly what Ben Mali MacFadyen from Eco Drama has been doing throughout the Out to Play project. Working with children and teachers across Glasgow, Out to Play seeks to facilitate interaction with the natural world through quality artistic experiences, re-thinking traditional views of nature as merely ‘sites’ and ‘reserves’, noticing and appreciating nature on our doorstep.

Sessions have been tailored to the unique surroundings of each school, and through imaginative play & adventurous learning, Out to Play aims to deepen young people’s connection to our natural world.

Ben’s blog offers a detailed and reflective account of the process thus far, providing some wonderful insights into the children’s learning. He has also shared a number of very practical ideas and approaches for engaging pupils in the outdoors.

For further information on Education Scotland support for outdoor learning, click here.