Outdoor area
 

We are currently looking at improving our outdoor patio area, but I am running out of ideas of what to do. I have put up shapes and numbers already, we have slides, seesaws, a home corner area, some sand, soil and gravel pits. Please give me some more ideas!

I seem to get to the point where I think about it too much and run out of steam. Thanks

What about a gardening area? - even if you do not have a sutiable plot to dig and plant up, you can provide trays with 'clean' compost/peat with suitable/safe garden implements, buckets, containers and wheelbarrows.

You can provide kites and windcatchers, gymnastic ribbons - or cheap and cheerful but just as good - strips of crepe paper for the children to run around with them trailing behind in the wind.

Bubble makers/blowers , water play - bowls to wash dolls, other 'solid' toys such as farm or zoo animals/dry, water play with containers, scoops, tubes etc, bamboo chutes for water to run down - or small balls/large marbles (depending on age) etc or aqua canal system and boats.

Musical instruments - some can be mounted (large scale) and windchimes. Equipment to go on a bug hunt - containers, magnifying glasses etc, crayons to observe and draw outside, crayons to make bark rubbings. Take painting, chalking etc outside.

Use radio controlled cars/flying saucers etc
metal detectors - hand or on a stick.

parachutes, scarves, hoops etc

then of course, there's good old fashioned running races etc and ring games, take blankets/teddies out for picnics etc Use music outside for dancing or singing.

If you have a paved area they can paint with water, chalk it etc, you can have treasure hunts outside, take costumes outside etc

I can't think of anything else at this precise moment, but I'm sure there are lots of other ideas.

Hi I recently attended a two day How to Promote Natural Outdoor Play course and it certainly opened up my eyes. One of the suggestions was an outdoor box - along the lines of the treasure box. It can include a range of boxes, tubes, fabric or anything you can lay your hands on - leave it out for the children to discover providing child led play, they always have far more exciting ideas of what to do with a cardboard tube than adults do!! The benefits of the equipement are that play is not limited unlike many pieces of equipment such as slides, it's cheap or free and can therefore be changed regularly.

I introduced ours shortly after the course and have seen some fantastic play.

Hope this helps. Claire

We have some tree trunks donated by the local tree surgeon.

The children collect interesting natural things like cones, conkers, leaves, bits of bark etc and spend ages making pictures with them.

We also have 3 lengths of guttering on the wall for water play :cheerful:

Hi,

We have just done some outdoor bags for different weathers. It is just something that we can get out to add more to the outside play.
Rainy day bag, sunny day bag, windy day bag

They each have things like an experiment to do, things to play with and some physical play.

One that has worked really well is our Sunny day bag, I put in some mirrors and shallow dishes and fill the dishes with water and catching the sunlight on the mirrors in the water can create rainbows which the children love to do and then describe the shape, colours etc. They also just love getting the sun to reflect and move when they move the mirrors. It had one of our children who is SEN enthralled for ages, most animated they had ever been.


Windy day - kites, boom whackers hanging up for sound, windmills etc..