Teachers, parents, and of course the students of James S. McCormick School in Lacombe had a chance to take in some hands-on, outdoor play-based learning, thanks to a mentorship project funded by TD Friends of the Environment grant.

The grant brought Ever Active Schools, which is provincial intuitive designed to create healthy school communities and Bienenstock Natural Playground, an Ontario based group that specializes in natural playgrounds, to the school on Monday to showcase their outdoor natural play workshop.

Director of Education with Bienenstock Natural Playgrounds Jill Bienenstock, says their natural playground model encourages kids to get outside in a more meaningful way that is sometimes missed in organized sports.

“Kids need to move more, we need to balance out that time they are so sedentary with screens or organized sports. Organized sports are great, but if they’re always sitting in their car going to an organized sport, or waiting for their turn at an organized sport, it’s different from having them play…outdoor, unstructured free play is something that’s missing, so we try to bring in movement and an activity level wherever we can.”

The kids turned sod, shovelled soil, learned how to plant in newspaper pots, painted and built stick fences to promote ownership of the plants in the garden beds, and prepared seed balls all while being physically active and learning new skills.

Dr. Clark Svcrek is a family Doctor with the Department of Family Medicine and was on hand as well.

He spoke about the importance of unstructured free play for kids, especially outside.

“So there some known health benefits from being outdoors and being connected with nature, and those benefits are plenty: improvements in mental health and student wellness from a physical literacy standpoint, and a connectedness with your peers and a sense of community from being outdoors and active. They’re getting their hands in the earth and getting a bunch of the immune system development benefits from being exposed to those ancient microbiotas that are in the earth. So many benefits.”

Teachers at the school will continue with the growing process with their students for the rest of the school year, and will also be maintained during the summer, so kids can see the fruits of the labour in the fall.