Outdoor play and learning
We know the benefits of high-quality outdoor learning, exercise and play for children in terms of their physical and mental wellbeing and development.
That is why we focused on increasing children’s access to outdoor play and learning during the delivery of the expansion of funded early learning and childcare (ELC) to 1,140 hours. Indeed, it is our vision that children in Scotland’s ELC sector will spend as much time outdoors as they do indoors and time outdoors will happen every day, in every setting.
It's a really exciting time for ELC and outdoor learning in Scotland. More and more settings are now fully outdoors or expanding their outdoor facilities and experiences to increase children's opportunities for quality outdoor play and learning.
Together with Inspiring Scotland, we published Scotland’s Coalition for Outdoor Play and Learning position statement which commits the signatories to embedding playing and learning outdoors as an everyday activity and to celebrate it as a fundamental part of growing up in Scotland.
Guidance for ELC practitioners
We have produced a guide for ELC practitioners providing practical advice on how to access outdoor spaces.
We have also published design guidance for the provision of high quality outdoor spaces for early learning and childcare and out of school care settings.
There is also a range of resources on Education Scotland's Professional Learning page to provide support for professional development in outdoor learning across the 3 to 18 curriculum.
The national practice guidance “Realising the Ambition: Being Me” and the Curriculum for Excellence support and encourage learning through play across the early level. It is designed to support the implementation of a responsive, continuous, play-based curriculum for children from age three until the end of Primary One (for most children).