‘Inside out’, 2007-08
Creative Partnerships Sheffield
Sir Harold Jackson Primary School

Sir Harold Jackson Primary School has an extensive outdoor space which includes a large field and an area of woodland. Gillian was Lead Creative Partner, working with the staff and children to research:

• How much learning can be transferred from the inside to the outside?
• What would an inside out school look like and how would the curriculum and the daily life of the children differ from what happens now?

In order to encourage the school community to start using the outdoors more for learning across the curriculum Gillian set up a series of events and activities to raise their awareness to the outdoor environment:

• organised two camping evenings with games, treasure hunts in the woods and a campfire. This was an opportunity for the children and staff to be at school after dark and to experience a different kind of interaction with the space and each other.

• transformed a classroom into an ‘outside in’ room. The floor was turfed with real grass; there were trees and other vegetation and a video of the woods was projected onto the interactive whiteboard with a sound track of birdsong and insects. The room was used as a classroom for four weeks for over 300 children before being dismantled. During that time the grass continued to grow.

• created an ‘inside out’ classroom in the woods, with tables and chairs, whiteboard, tarpaulin roof and carpet. This was less successful to the ‘outside in’ classroom, mainly because it happened in January with high winds, rain and cold.

• worked with a Reception teacher and a Y5 teacher with their classes, delivering their class topics outdoors.

The programme created a lot of buzz in the school, highlighting existing attitudes to the outdoors and causing debate about how working outside could be made more accessible and become an intrinsic part of the school ethos. Its value as a way of stimulating and improving learning was better understood and the school is continuing to find ways to deliver more of the curriculum outside.

 

All images © Gillian Brent