This immersive day of talks, workshops and walkshops will explore children's opportunities for play outdoors in all settings—at home, at school, in child care, the community and nature.
The conference is FREE! You'll even get a spot of lunch but registration is ESSENTIAL as places are limited.
At "Checkout" you will be asked to select your morning and afternoon workshop options. These workshops are hands on, whatever the weather you'll be going out to play so please dress appropriately.
WORKSHOP OPTIONS
Visual Art Experiences in the Outdoors (Lucy Hill)
When creativity is fundamentally and necessarily chaotic, destructive and potentially transformative,how can it be supported and sustained in preschool? How might the unpredictability of the Irish weather contribute to creative early childhood education practices? What kind of education is enabled through prioritising multiplicities? This illustrated talk is based on research undertaken at a preschool in Westport in 2017. The talk will be punctuated by opportunities to explore the wide range of materials that contributed to the research, including paint, ice, flowers, fire, fish, seaweed,
cameras, crabs, snails, sticks and mud.
Don't Say "Be Careful" (Sinéad Pollock Orr)
The workshop will give Parents and Early Years Educators some fun, practical ideas for playing outdoors, in all weathers and all seasons. How to make the most of different types of outdoor spaces and how simple and natural resources are best.
Nature Play: Early years learning in the Outdoors (Mark O’Connor)
Mark will share his hands-on approach on how to use nature to stimulate learning in the great outdoors.
Learning in Nature's Playground (Bernard Joyce)
The workshop will explore the importance of nature in learning and play. Participants will have an opportunity to participate in some fun nature games and share some ideas and tips for using outdoors’ spaces.
Aistear In The Outdoors (Avril Grufferty & Grace O’Malley)
This workshop brings the team from ‘Outdoor Explorers’ to share with us their journey in providing quality natural play spaces for young children. In Ireland we have a great need to improve the design and provision of natural outdoor play spaces. They bring an understanding of how young children play and the spaces and natural materials they need to play. Their pioneering outdoor preschool will provide educators to ideas on how to make the leap to natural outdoor play as they showcase their practice and bring Aistear to life.
