WHERE LEARNING TAKES ROOT
The Power of Outdoor Exploration in Early Childhood
By Chelsea Wilson
At ACS Hillingdon, we know that meaningful learning doesn’t only happen inside four walls. For our youngest learners in Early Childhood, the outdoors becomes a living classroom – one that sparks curiosity, inspires creativity, and supports every step of their development. Through a play-based approach to learning, our children are encouraged to explore the world around them in open-ended, hands-on ways. And there’s no better place to do that than in nature.
Why Outdoor Learning Matters
Play is at the heart of early childhood education. It’s how children learn to collaborate, problem-solve, build confidence, and develop independence. When that play is extended into natural outdoor settings, the learning becomes even richer. Children take risks, test ideas, and interact with the environment in ways that foster both cognitive growth and emotional resilience. Our outdoor spaces allow for this kind of authentic, exploratory learning that supports every area of the curriculum.
Spaces That Spark Discovery
At ACS Hillingdon, we’re fortunate to have four thoughtfully designed outdoor learning environments:
The Early Childhood Playground – an extension of the classroom, ideal for scaled-up projects and collaborative construction.
The Outdoor Atelier – a natural studio space encouraging creativity and storytelling with real-world materials.
Court Park – a nearby public green space offering wide open fields, ancient oak trees, and abundant biodiversity.
Forest School – a wooded campus haven for immersive, child-led exploration and discovery.
These spaces aren’t just places to play – they’re intentionally used environments where learning comes to life.
Connecting Learning Indoors and Out
Throughout the year, our teaching teams plan purposeful ways to bring classroom concepts outdoors, creating memorable and meaningful learning experiences across subjects.
During a science unit on force and motion, students built large-scale marble runs on the playground, applying classroom learning to a more dynamic, hands-on context.
In a social studies unit on the history of technology, children used the Outdoor Atelier to recreate traditional ways of living – constructing log cabins, building pretend hearths, and even attempting to sew handmade clothing.
For a unit on rainforests, students visited Court Park weekly to explore a local ecosystem. After reading The Great Kapok Tree in class, students made powerful real-world connections, noticing the absence of animals in a deforested space and relating it back to what they had read.
These are not one-off activities – they are lasting learning moments. Students revisit them, reflect on them, and apply their insights in new contexts throughout the year.
Forest School: Learning That’s Wild at Heart
Our Forest School programme is a cornerstone of outdoor learning in Early Childhood. Held weekly in our on-campus woodland, these sessions are fully child-led and unplugged from traditional curriculum goals – but no less impactful. Children climb, build, tell stories, and explore their surroundings at their own pace. In doing so, they develop skills that are foundational to lifelong learning: perseverance, communication, curiosity, and empathy.
While Forest School may not follow the classroom curriculum directly, it supports the very thinking skills and approaches to learning that empower children back in the classroom – making them stronger, more confident learners overall.
Growing More Than Knowledge
Our outdoor learning spaces are not just a setting for play. They are carefully curated environments where thinking takes shape, friendships grow, and the roots of learning run deep. By connecting curriculum with nature, and supporting children’s natural curiosity in open-ended ways, we create opportunities for exploration that are joyful, meaningful, and lasting. It’s here, beneath the trees, across the fields, and in the mud kitchens and log cabins, that some of the most powerful learning truly takes root.
