7 Family-Friendly Outdoor Learning Activities
This post is part of our archived content. While we’ve shifted focus, it still may be useful.
Whether you homeschool or send them off every morning, outdoor learning is something all parents should try.
Not only is running about great for their mental and physical health but there is a raft of educational opportunities just out the door, hidden in plain sight.
If you’ve got kids, you need to bundle them up and shove them out the door.
Think of the outdoors as a classroom filled with natural materials and learning opportunities.
The suggestions below are really a masterful mashup of PE, science, history, geography, horticulture, and maths and were a godsend for us when we homeschooled in 2020.
If you’re on the fence about whether to send your kids back to school or not, read this article on reasons to homeschool.
1. Geocache
There’s a time before knowing what a geocache is and then, the time after – and you’ll never be the same again. Geocaching is the world’s largest treasure hunt.
More than three million geocaches have been hidden in parks, trails and urban areas.
It’s high tech – utilising GPS tracking combined with outdoor adventure, it’s an activity that can be taken up anywhere in the world, by anyone, of all ages.
Finding the GPS coordinates is one part of the game, but first, you have to find the treasure.
‘Geocache’ is the name for the ‘treasure’ that has been hidden by geocache-lovers in all sorts of nooks and crannies over the world.
You need a smartphone to sign up and once you open the app, you can get started.
You pinpoint rough locations of hidden geocaches (these might be boxes filled with tiny trinkets or film canisters stuffed with a paper log of successful geocachers – small and able to withstand the elements) and using the GPS, you hone on in and have to search.
When you find the cache, you fill in the logbook, log the find on the app and return it for the next lot of treasure seekers.
Way before we knew we would have to find ways to socially distance, Treasure Trails made a business out of support bubbles going on enormously fun and educational walks in various locations all over the UK.
Each trail has been devised for young detectives and budding spies to follow clues, crack the codes and all the while get to learn real-life amazing stories as you wind down backstreets and through hidden corners of villages, towns and cities.
There’s a mystery to solve at the end but the real treat is getting out and really ‘seeing’ what is outside your door.
Clues are cleverly entwined with architecture and local history so each trail is entirely different.
Perfect for history buffs and those who appreciate a good long walk.
Treasure Trails are self-guided, downloadable and cost a mere tenner.
There are wheelchair and buggy-accessible options and you can, for most trails, take your (well-behaved) dog on a lead.
If you get stuck, you can text Treasure Trails for help.
3. Mudlarking
A long-standing favourite learning activity of ours, mudlarking is the muddiest outdoorsy fun you can have while accidentally working on your observational skills.
It’s a Thames-centric natural scavenger hunt, so check the current guidelines if you don’t live in London near the river.
Here’s how it works:
Check the Port of London Authority website to find low tide times and head out to one of the entry points to the Thames foreshore.
Because the Thames has been used by humans as a major transportation site for thousands of years, it is full of discarded treasure.
It’s worth doing a little research before you go.
That way, you’ll be able to identify hand-painted Victorian pottery shards, medieval pots, remnants of old bottles and clay pipes that go back 400 years.
There are shimmering pieces of iridescent glass, tiny garnets, old coins, and if you know what you are looking for, roof tiles that still have smoke marks from the Great Fire of London.
You need a permit to dig up to 7.5 centimetres which costs £35 for kids aged 12 to14, £60 for teenagers aged 15 to 17 and £90 for an adult.
You’ll also need sensible shoes, rubber gloves and hand gel.
Think of a pair of Walkie Talkies as an old school pre-smart phone without the addictive damaging bits.
Walkie Talkies these days are great quality, robust communication tools perfect for kids in need of outdoor play.
We bought a set of three for our middle boys for Christmas and they’ve been enhancing their long-discarded games of hide and seek using the Walkie Talkies.
They’ve taken them up trees, hid with them under bushes and tested out frequency and distance capacity by travelling as far as they can from each other.
With a Walkie Talkie, your kids will have to practice patience (waiting for the receiver to figure out which buttons to use to respond), technical skills (replacing the batteries) and physical prowess (shimmying up trees to hide).
5. Make Your Own Local Tour
Think you know your local streets pretty well? Know your neighbourhood like the back of your hand?
Well, how about challenging your kids to create a local tour to take you on?
You could go for a real, factual tour by getting your children to research the area properly, putting a walk together as you wander the streets.
Or, you could encourage them to make up a fake tour using their best imaginative fictional ‘facts’.
Even better, why not create a tour that is filled with both historical stories and some outrageous made-up ideas and see which of the tour takers can guess the difference?
Finish the experiment with a takeaway hot chocolate and you’ll have learned a little more about your neighbourhood and a little more about your kid’s ability to trick you with made-up nonsense.
Tipping entirely optional.
6. Kensington Gardens Allotment
For kids interested in learning about the natural world, the Kensington Gardens Allotment is open to visit every day from 10 am until 16.30.
Situated behind the Sackler Gallery in Kensington Gardens along Buck Hill Walk, it is a beautiful space run by a small group of volunteers.
Members of the public are welcome to wander in anytime to see what’s currently being grown as well as pick up useful tips on growing their own fruit and vegetables.
While you’re in Kensington Gardens, take a walk to the Henry Moore sculpture along the Serpentine bank and give your kids a little refresher course in English art history.
Look out into the lake and you’ll be able to spot a variety of birds and if you seek out one of the playgrounds in the park, you’ll be ticking off a PE lesson to boot.
7. Outdoor School
Wrap up warm, get out into the parks and playgrounds and rediscover outdoor learning.
How about dusting off those rollerblades/roller skates/skateboard/cricket set/football/bike and taking them to the park for a spin?
Once-smaller kids might have grown into older siblings discarded stuff and a good rummage around might be just the reminder of this you need.
Use natural materials like trees and rocks and stumps to touch and clamber over.
Don’t be afraid of letting the kids get grubby.
Blast away some of the sadness we all feel being stuck inside and make your own science experiments.
Collect leaves, compare them, and search for rocks and pinecones.
You could also teach the kids how to become more self-reliant via homesteading.
Kids learn when they are having fun – so get out there!
What are your favourite ways to implement outdoor learning into the school day?