{"id":768,"date":"2016-05-16T18:49:13","date_gmt":"2016-05-16T18:49:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/?p=768"},"modified":"2016-05-16T18:49:13","modified_gmt":"2016-05-16T18:49:13","slug":"masterchef-and-the-mud-kitchen-why-is-outdoor-play-so-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/2016\/05\/16\/masterchef-and-the-mud-kitchen-why-is-outdoor-play-so-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Masterchef and the mud kitchen- why is outdoor play so good?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IMG_0855[1]\"<\/a>\u00a0 This was the scene at our mud kitchen this afternoon.\u00a0 Lots of busy wee people chatting to each other as they cooked up some delicious looking mud.\u00a0 There is great emphasis put on outdoor learning by the government and by leading educationalists just now.\u00a0 The notion that young children learn best through play in a stimulating environment is one that we completely believe in at \u00a0Milngavie Nursery.\u00a0 We are lucky enough to share the school garden and\u00a0play in\u00a0it on a daily basis with our children.\u00a0 It provides a beautiful environment in which to learn.\u00a0 It is ideal for imaginative play- we have a willow den, a play hut and 2 wee play houses, as well as little areas of the garden where we can hide, or get together with our friends to work together, or just chat.\u00a0 There are trees to climb and 2 great slides, which provide a bit of challenge for those who like to be active.\u00a0\u00a0We also have\u00a0a great board walk which we can run down, or roll things down, and plenty of benches and seats for those who want to do a bit of drawing, make a picture or read a story.<\/p>\n

Every area of the curriculum can be explored in the garden and often in more meaningful and physical ways than in our playrooms.\u00a0 The quality of play is better out of doors.\u00a0 The fresh air and exercise and the freedom to run and to make a noise are so good for wee people.\u00a0 Their spatial awareness and physical confidence is improved by the freedom to move, to climb, to balance, jump and slide.\u00a0 It is much more likely that children will be interested in the world around them if they are actually out in it, experiencing it.\u00a0 A book with a lovely picture of a frog will never be the same as watching one up close and listening to the noise it makes.\u00a0 Emotionally too, the garden is a good place for children.\u00a0 Most children enjoy the space and it is always more difficult to get them back inside than get them out!<\/p>\n

The chat in the garden can be amazing – this morning I watched one of our wee boys holding his own yoga class.\u00a0 He had obviously watched someone doing yoga very carefully and knew some great yoga positions.\u00a0 The other children were really interested in what he was doing and he soon had a wee crowd trying out the lotus position and yoga “moves”.\u00a0 He spiced it up with some karate chops at the end, that perhaps weren’t strictly in the spirit of the first part of his class, but his friends loved it.\u00a0 There was lots of great use of descriptive language and serious faces and concentration and then lots of smiling and laughing.\u00a0 Watching children learn from one another is a joy.<\/p>\n

Later I saw two three year olds making a cup of tea and having a natter like little old ladies – practising the skills adults use every day.\u00a0 They had observed adult relationships and were trying them out themselves – learning together how conversations and friendships work.\u00a0“I’ll be the mum- now just you don’t touch that – it’s hot!”<\/p>\n

It might be messy and you do get dirty, but nothing beats outdoors!<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0850[1]\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 This was the scene at our mud kitchen this afternoon.\u00a0 Lots of busy wee people chatting to each other as they cooked up some delicious looking mud.\u00a0 There is great emphasis put on outdoor learning by the government and … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50272,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50272"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=768"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":769,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions\/769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.glowscotland.org.uk\/glowblogs\/milngavienursery\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}