By Lee Wray Davies, Eco-Schools Manager, Eco-Schools England

Apprehensively, Eco-Coordinators across England checked the weather report on the morning of May 18^th … VICTORY even the sun was coming out to play for Outdoor Classroom Day 2017.

Eco-students and staff embraced a full day of outdoor fun; taking part in a huge variety of activities from welly throwing contests to alfresco Italian lessons this year.

Well done to all our Eco-Schools who turned their sometimes unloved school grounds, into entertaining and exciting outdoor classrooms.  Don’t forget, schools can now use all of these accomplishments as evidence when applying for their internationally recognised Eco-Schools Green Flag – bonus!

Outdoor Classroom Day at Alkrington Primary School

I was very privileged to spend the day at Alkrington Primary School in Manchester, one of our 2^nd Green Flag Eco-Schools. They had LOTS planned thanks to the amazing work of their Eco-Coordinator, Mrs Nixon and all the staff; nature trails, making bird feeders, bug hunting, designing the perfect Eco-Garden, boot camp, running, throwing, hopping, skipping  and cartwheeling (I opted out of the last one) – we all slept well that night!

This was just one of the 1000s of Eco-Schools in England and around the world who took part in Outdoor Classroom Day – can you imagine how much fun 1 million children must have had spending time in the open air? Thanks to Project Dirt and all the partners, teachers were given the opportunity to take students of all ages outside to experience a different way of learning. Teachers could feel confident that in the safe confines of the school grounds children could take part in new activities such as tree climbing, which a generation ago were the norm when playing out.

As the new Eco-Schools Manager for England this was my first experience of Outdoor Classroom Day but I’m hooked –  I wish I was still a teacher so I could sign up for 2018!

You can follow Eco-Schools UK on Twitter on @EcoSchools 

The global #OutdoorClassroomDay movement has multiple dates to suit all climates and school term times around the world. The next Outdoor Classroom Day activations days are on 7 September 2017, 12 October 2017 and 17 May 2018. Join schools around the world and register your school here: www.outdoorclassroomday.com Let’s make outdoor learning and play part of the every day!