The great outdoors provides a rich learning environment. However, you needn’t limit your child’s outdoor learning to gardening alone. Your child can benefit by being taught all sorts of subjects in the wonderful natural world. Outdoor maths activities are a great example.
Not only does learning outside with your little one provide amazing bonding opportunities for you both, it’s great for making use of the brilliant natural resources that are on offer!
This blog explores some simple but fun ideas for how to promote outdoor maths activities and numeracy skills outside. Whether you’re at the park, at home or in the Little Muddy Boots Garden, read on for some outdoor learning inspiration.
1. Write numbers out of twigs
Collect some sticks and try writing numbers out of them. This is a great activity to boost number recognition. Also, let’s be honest, what child doesn’t love collecting sticks?
2. Go fruit picking
Go berry picking and use your spoils to do a bit of numeracy before eating as your reward. Try portioning the fruit out between friends or family members by counting out equal amounts for each person.
3. Count how many insects you can spot on a nature walk
Go on an insect-hunting adventure! Write down how many different kinds of insects you find. Get your child to count out each time you spot a new one.
4. Make a tower out of pebbles
Collect some stones or pebbles and use them to carefully build towers. Count out loud as you stack them. You could also try and stack them in a pyramid formation going from largest number to smallest.
5. Create a scavenger hunt
A great one for building confidence with counting. Create a scavenger hunt and collect various numbers of petals, herbs and other treasures. An example of what to collect could be one sprig of rosemary, two mint leaves, three pink petals, 4 daisies, etc. Use whatever you have in your (or a loved one’s!) garden to create a great sensory outdoor maths activity. Sensory experiences in nature are very beneficial to children’s development and wellbeing; you can read more about the sensory garden we donated to Cranbourne Primary School here.
6. Find shapes in nature
Shapes are everywhere in nature. Learning about shapes is a great way to boost your child’s maths skills. Understanding how many sides and corners each has in an outdoor environment is a useful activity. Look out for oval tree stumps, rectangular planters, a round sunflower head, the shape of various leaves, fruits and petals, and much more!
