As the leaves change and the air turns crisp, it’s the perfect time to think about taking learning outside. I'm excited to share highlights of our recent webinar, Getting Outdoorsy with CLASS®: Going Beyond the Classroom Walls to Engage Children in Meaningful Interactions.

This session, a hit at our 2025 InterAct Summit, explored a topic central to our mission at Teachstone®: leveraging the power of interactions to help more students thrive. Presenters Leah Zabari and Beth Simon, Program Quality Assessors with The Pennsylvania Key, shared practical ways to extend CLASS interactions into outdoor environments.

It's About Intention, Not Location

Leah and Beth shift the perspective on outdoor time from being just a 'break from learning' to an enriching 'extension of learning.' This doesn't mean more work for educators. It’s about making the most of the time and space already available.

Benefits of Outdoor Learning:

  • Physical & Sensory Health: Beyond developing gross motor skills, outdoor time reduces sensory overload common in classrooms and promotes a balanced, calm state.
  • Cognitive Development & Creativity: Nature engages the senses, sparks imagination, encourages creative play, and improves focus.
  • Risk-Taking & Resilience: The outdoors provides safe challenges, allowing children to evaluate risks, overcome obstacles, and develop persistence.
  • Social-Emotional Growth: Children practice problem-solving, interact with peers, manage stress, and build confidence.

Bridging the Gap with CLASS®

Leah and Beth provided practical steps for taking learning outside with CLASS®, emphasizing that the outdoors can be an extension of our typical learning spaces.  By using intentional interactions, fostering relationships, and including meaningful language, educators can deepen children’s learning outdoors.

Strategies That Work (Starting Tomorrow)

Our speakers shared easy ways to begin. You don't need special equipment or big changes:

  • Set a Purpose: Give outdoor time intention. Instead of “go play outside,” try “let’s see how many different bugs we can find.”
  • Provide Tools: Hands-on materials like magnifying glasses, bug nets, or DIY tools spark curiosity and engagement.
  • Get Kids Talking: Encourage children to work together to find things, ask each other questions, and share their discoveries. This builds social skills and deepens learning.
  • Record Discoveries: Have children draw, chart, or write about what they observe, connecting outdoor time to literacy and math.
  • Read Related Books: Extend the learning by reading books about nature and outdoor exploration to spark further curiosity. 

Simple Outdoor Activities

Here are some simple activities that work with these strategies:

  • Curiosity Walks: Take kids outside and ask, "What do you notice?" Use their answers to ask more questions and keep the conversation going.
  • Nature Collections: Have children gather leaves, rocks, or sticks. Then sort and compare them together. This builds language, math, and science skills.
  • Outdoor Stories: Ask kids to make up stories about what they see. Where is that bird going? How do ants work as a team? This gets their imagination working.
  • Problem-Solving Challenges: Give kids a task like building a fort with sticks or moving water from one spot to another. Let them work together to figure it out.
  • Quiet Listening: Stop for one minute to listen to outdoor sounds. Then talk about how it made everyone feel. This helps kids understand their emotions.

Getting Past Common Problems

Many educators worry about limited space, bad weather, or safety issues. Our presenters had good advice: think smaller. Even a small patch of grass works. A potted plant can spark learning. A walk around the building counts too.

The key is making any outdoor time count, no matter how small the space.

Ready to Learn More?

If this conversation sparked new ideas for your practice, we invite you to keep learning with Teachstone:

  • Bring learning to your team. Host a Custom Event tailored to your educators.
  • Connect with peers. Join the CLASS® Learning Community and exchange ideas with 50K+ educators.
  • Go deeper at InterAct. Join us at the InterAct CLASS® Summit in Chicago, April 28–29, 2026, for more sessions on bringing CLASS® interactions to life.
  • Watch the full webinar recording here. You can also find the recordings of all on-demand webinars in our Resources Library.