Outdoor Learning and Play

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xv

   PDF

2. Outdoors and Nature in Pedagogical Practices and in Cultural Historical Theory

   • Liv Torunn Grindheim, Hanne Værum Sørensen, Angela Rekers

   Pages 1-21Open Access

3. Toddlers’ Outdoor Play, Imagination and Cultural Formation

   • Avis Ridgway, Gloria Quiñones, Liang Li

   Pages 23-42Open Access

4. Providing Outdoor Experiences for Infants and Toddlers: Pedagogical Possibilities and Challenges from a Brazilian Early Childhood Education Centre Case Study

   • Natália Meireles Santos da Costa, Maria Clotilde Rossetti-Ferreira, Ana Maria de Araujo Mello

   Pages 43-59Open Access

5. Princesses (Don’t) Run in the Mud: Tracing the Child’s Perspective in Parental Perceptions of Cultural Formation Through Outdoor Activities in Norwegian ECEs

   • Alicja R. Sadownik

   Pages 61-78Open Access

6. Children’s Play and Social Relations in Nature and Kindergarten Playgrounds: Examples from Norway

   • Hanne Værum Sørensen

   Pages 79-93Open Access

7. Utilisation and Design of Kindergarten Outdoor Space and the Outdoor Activities: A Case Study of Kindergartens in Bergen, Norway and Anji in China

   • Wanqiu Meng, Min He

   Pages 95-110Open Access

8. Time Regulation as Institutional Condition for Children’s Outdoor Play and Cultural Formation in Kindergarten

   • Åsta Birkeland, Hanne Værum Sørensen

   Pages 111-128Open Access

9. Exploring the Taken-for-Granted Advantage of Outdoor Play in Norwegian Early Childhood Education

   • Liv Torunn Grindheim

   Pages 129-144Open Access

10. ‘All of the Wild’: Cultural Formation in Wales Through Outdoor Play at Forest School

    • Angela Rekers, Jane Waters-Davies

    Pages 145-160Open Access

11. E-STEM in Everyday Life: How Families Develop a Caring Motive Orientation Towards the Environment

    • Sylvia Christine Almeida, Marilyn Fleer

    Pages 161-181Open Access

12. Curious Curiosity – Reflections on How Early Childhood Lecturers Perceive Children’s Curiosity

    • Marianne Presthus Heggen, Anne Myklebust Lynngård

    Pages 183-201Open Access

13. Correction to: Outdoor Learning and Play

    • Liv Torunn Grindheim, Hanne Værum Sørensen, Angela Rekers

    Pages C1-C1Open Access

This Open Access book examines children’s participation in dialectical reciprocity with place-based institutional practices by presenting empirical research from Australia, Brazil, China, Poland, Norway and Wales. Underpinned by cultural-historical theory, the analysis reveals how outdoors and nature form unique conditions for children's play, formal and informal learning and cultural formation. The analysis also surfaces how inequalities exist in societies and communities, which often limit and constrain families' and children's access to and participation in outdoor spaces and nature. The findings highlight how institutional practices are shaped by pedagogical content, teachers' training, institutional regulations and societal perceptions of nature, children and suitable, sustainable education for young children. Due to crises, such as climate change and the recent pandemic, specific focus on the outdoors and nature in cultural formation is timely for the cultural-historical theoretical tradition. In doing so, the book provides empirical and theoretical support for policy makers, researchers, educators and families to enhance, increase and sustain outdoor and nature education.

• Open Access
• benefits of outdoor activities for young children
• children’s health, well-being, learning and development
• development of pedagogical practices
• cultural formation at a personal level
• cultural formation at an institutional level
• cultural formation at a societal level
• everyday practices of interactions between children and parents
• three- and four-year-old’s play activities
• children’s exploration
• outdoor play and learning in Australia
• outdoor play and learning in Denmark
• outdoor play and learning in China
• outdoor play and learning in England
• outdoor play and learning in Norway
• outdoor play and learning in Poland
• Place-based learning and play

• KINDknow Kindergarten Knowledge Centre for Systemic Research on Diversity and Sustainable Futures, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, Bergen, Norway

  Liv Torunn Grindheim

• VIA University College, Aarhus, Denmark

  Hanne Værum Sørensen

• Institute of Education and Humanities, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, Carmarthen, UK

  Angela Rekers

Liv Torunn Grindheim is a Professor in Early Childhood Pedagogy at Kindergarten Knowledge Centre for Systemic Research on Diversity and Sustainable Futures, at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. She received her PhD in social studies of childhood from Norwegian centre for child research, Norwegian University of Science and Technology/Norway. Her research interests are play, conditions for children’s exploration, cultural formation, children as citizens and sustainability in ECE. Her research has been published in Journals such as Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, and European Early Childhood Education Research Journal. She has also published chapters in scientific anthologies at Springer and Brill.   

Angela Rekers, PhD, is a lecturer on Health, Social and Childhood Studies at Neath Port Talbot Colleges Group, Wales. Angela holds an MSc in Environmental Education for Sustainability and has worked in the field of experiential and outdoor learning for 20 years. Her research interests include education for social and ecological justice, multimodal literacies, inclusive participation and inclusive research methodologies.