Skip to main content

Rockport Public Schools

Outdoor Classroom

Outdoor Classroom

In our outdoor classroom, the children have opportunities to participate in open ended exploration and unstructured play; two valuable components to a child’s life long learning.  The children are given chances to discover, experiment, and respond to the natural elements around them throughout the seasons.  


We have created a space that fosters and supports internal connections with the natural environment and allows children to reflect within themselves to build their self identity, awareness, and esteem.  The natural elements can offer rewarding and thought-producing opportunities for children to experience and develop patience, focus, strength, survival, endurance, kindness, curiosity, and confidence.  


The children will find a mud kitchen for cooking, chalkboards, easels, and a sensory garden planted with herbs of different scents and textures.  Water and sand areas are available for the children to explore and engineer designs, experiment, and reflect on their observations.  The outdoor classroom is shaped by plantings and trees provide shade for gathering under to listen to a story, draw, paint or just sit and observe.


The outdoor classroom was funded by the generosity of the Education Foundation of Rockport and was established in spring of 2021.

 

Two young children play at a rustic outdoor mud kitchen with a sink.
Two young children play on a small purple slide outdoors on a grassy area.
A young child in a lime green jacket uses a small orange tool to explore items in a muffin tin outdoors.
Children interact with a large, outdoor art installation made of metal and wood.
A young child in a red plaid shirt looks through a black metal structure outdoors.
A child in a yellow hat looks at the camera while sitting on a wooden bench outdoors.
Four children wearing winter hats and jackets gather around a fire pit outdoors.
A young child wearing a brown beanie and puffer jacket holds a muffin tin filled with baked goods.
Three children stand under a wooden archway with a sign that reads 'Nature's Classroom'.