Love Outdoors! An Outdoor Literacy Activity

Valentine’s Day provides ample opportunities to get outside. This blog post shares some literacy-based ideas for middle and upper primary school-aged children that I did with workshop participants one February in-set day.

The first task was to make some green hearts to take outside…

The paper is folded in half first of all before the template is drawn in red. You need two pieces.

Cut out around the red lines including the line in the middle.

Weave the two pieces together – practice in advance of doing this with children.

This is how the woven heart should look.

When you squeeze it gently at the edges, it will open to create a mini basket.

Add string if you wish to hang these up somewhere outside.

As we made our way to the woodland area to gather, participants had to find something they liked or loved that could fit into our little hearts. Upon arrival at the woods we shared our objects which ranged from leaves to chocolate wrappers! We created some phrases which in themselves made a nice group poem when spoken aloud within a circle, e.g.

On our way outside today, we found…
A little heart-shaped leaf
A chocolate wrapper
…..

Next the participants were asked to write a Tanka poem alone and in peace. I’ve seen different types but all seem to have 5 lines. Some pure forms insist on the correct number of syllables in each line but bear in mind this can detract from the quality of the writing as children can get hung up counting the syllables. Others have different expectations. Generally there is an element of nature and strong emotions in a Tanka.

I wrote the instructions on a portable whiteboard. Luckily I had used permanent marker pen as it was raining. The writing can be removed with nail polish remover or other products (look for eco friendly ones where possible).

Again, we shared our poems and then folded them up to put in our green hearts. Next, we took turns to hang our hearts up on a small tree. As we did so, we stated our responses to the question “If you planted a heart, what would grow?”

Because it was a short workshop, we did not decorate our hearts in ways that I would with children. I’d probably get children to create a class book of Tanka Poems in a heart shaped format too.

However I hope this has given you a few ideas for you and your class to “Love Outdoors” too!

I did a search to find a video about making paper hearts and this was the nearest I could find. It would seem they are Scandinavian in origin. Mine is a simple version – I got shown how to make them when I attended Brownies back in the Seventies!