Why is it that when we think back to our own childhoods, so many of the most outstanding and happy memories are of when we were outdoors? Building dens, walking along walls, rolling down grassy slopes, playing in mud, damming streams, doing risky things. Children today are no different. When asked what they like best about nursery, they invariably cite playing outside. Outdoor play is also vital for development. Children learn by moving, and movement needs space. Only through ready access to the outdoors and stimulating outdoor provision can a child's physical development, personal, social and emotional wellbeing and learning across the curriculum flourish.
The brain and body develop together, so children need to move to get their brains working well. As they move, they encounter and make discoveries about themselves and their own capabilities in relation to textures, smells, sights, tastes and sounds, and other people.
Margaret McMillan, the great pioneer of nursery education at the beginning of the last century, said that the young child needs 'space, that is ample space, as much as food and air'.
Crucially, outdoor play can allow children to move and develop at their own rate and in their own way (see case studies box). While one child is ready to be highly active, another is feeling reflective and wants to be still.
Child development studies show that children do better when they are free to move energetically as they feel like it. And the mark of good early years provision is when children are offered the choice to be mobile or not for most of the session.
The House of Commons Select Committee on Education and Employment has recognised the importance of the outdoors in its report on early years education. Among its recommendations were that 'to meet the requirements of the Early Learning Goals, every setting that is inspected by Ofsted should have sufficient space outdoors available to the children'. The QCA curriculum guidance for the foundation stage, too, constantly reinforces the importance of outdoor learning.
Yet, when it comes to deciding how to care for and educate young children, this holistic view is sometimes disregarded, and practitioners offer activities where all children are required to move as little as possible. We do so at our children's peril. Dr Tony Pelligrini, an American education researcher, has found that 'the more you keep children sitting, the less attentive they become'. And the related problems extend far beyond a poor attention span.
PHYSICAL HEALTH
Balancing needs practice. 'A well-organised balance system indicates a well-organised brain. Balance is trained through movement,' says Sally Goddard Blythe of the Institute for Neuro-physiological Psychology in Chester. If we are to support children's intellectual development, we have to give them opportunities for gross physical activity.
Children in general are less physically fit and more obese than they were ten years ago. More than one in five children aged under five is overweight. Being driven everywhere, eating fatty foods, watching TV and sitting in stuffy atmospheres leads to lethargic behaviour in adults and children. Over-protection means that children don't come into contact with enough bacteria to build up their immune systems while they are young.
Outdoors, however, active children sweat from effort, get their heart rate up and learn to enjoy the well-being that exercise brings - even if they do fall and graze their knees from time to time.
EMOTIONAL HEALTH
Outdoors brings out the best in children. Outdoor play that is available throughout the day calms children, whereas, on the other hand, when children think that the outdoor time is short or infrequent, they become over-excited about being outside and behave immaturely.
In stimulating environments that enable children to move about and collaborate with others, the behaviour of children who have problems regulating themselves is less marked and disturbing. Outside is not just a physical space - it is also an emotional space where children can stop and stare, breathe in the wonder of nature and find spiritual refreshment.
Offering safe space outdoors compensates for the loss of places in society where children can play freely. Cramped home conditions and lack of gardens lead to children being boisterous indoors with parents demanding that they be quiet and still.
And even when children are given more opportunities, many have their activities mapped out by parents at home and practitioners at nursery - 'time to go swimming, time to go to gym, time to make this picture with me'. Too many adult-directed activities cut across children's own interests.
We know from animal studies that impulses to move build up, like pressure cookers, in the nervous system. What are these children going to be like if they cannot express these urges at home or in nursery and reception class? At best, some three-and four-year-olds are being labelled 'naughty'; at worst, children are being diagnosed incorrectly as hyperactive (ADHD) or wrongly 'statemented' as having special educational needs, when in fact they only want places to play physically.
LITERACY
Outdoor space allows children to run and shout, balance and climb, imagine and talk. All these are activities which are the prerequisites of literacy.
Many foundation stage practitioners are worried about the widespread misinterpretation of the requirements of the literacy hour in reception classes. Margaret Hodge, the Government minister responsible for early years education, has confirmed that there is no actual requirement to do the literacy hour in reception classes. It is not appropriate or desirable for all four-or five-year-olds to be sitting first thing in the morning. Many children need to be stretching and strengthening their muscles because they have been relaxed in sleep.
For some children the daily 20 minutes of inactivity 'on the carpet' is physically impossible because their motor systems are not yet sufficiently mature to stay still for what, to them, is a long time. With powerful urges to move building up in the four-year-old's body, there is a strong possibility that their enjoyment of literacy and their self-esteem will be badly affected.
Writing is essentially a motor activity where children need to have developed complex co-ordination between the muscles of their eyes and hand. Their arm muscles need to be strong enough to pinch the pencil and hold it in place. Climbing and balancing are the motivating activities, which enable children to bring whole muscle groups to work together - the same muscle groups needed for reading and writing.
It is pitiful to hear children who are doing low-level colouring-in or worksheet tasks complaining that their arm hurts. Of course it does, if the muscles are not developed enough to support gripping the pencil or crayon. What better way to put a child off writing! Muscles learn that writing is painful and the brain then decides to do as little of that as possible.
BOYS AND GIRLS
Lack of activity is more problematic on the whole for boys than girls. Many boys and some girls feel more comfortable outside as they perceive the area as freer of adult restrictions and they can pursue more of their interests outside. Some girls need to learn to be safely adventurous and have a model of active female staff playing, for example, football, with them.
THE CURRICULUM
An emphasis on physical development does not make the outdoors simply a place for children to let off steam. The whole early years curriculum can be discovered outside, where many children feel most relaxed.
Some learning can only occur outside, for example:
* experiencing changes in the weather
* encountering living creatures
* gardening
* playing in mud and climbing trees
* spilling water
* running and shouting
* throwing, kicking balls and aiming for targets
* acting out stories that need plenty of space
* large-scale construction - you can't really build a realistic dinosaur inside!
The outdoors should also complement what is happening indoors, so children can take their learning further and deeper (see box).
PARENTS
Planning and implementing an outdoor curriculum can only be achieved with parents' support. Early years settings, therefore, need to explain its importance and stress the need for children to dress in clothes that are suitable for hard exercise in all weathers. If a few parents find that difficult, the setting needs to have a supply of suitable clothing for all weathers. Whether it's fair weather or foul, the outdoors is a crucial part of early years provision.