Math in Your Backyard

Do you know any children who have been spending a lot of time online lately, with distance learning? Here are a few ideas to help kids of all ages get outside—in their backyard or local green space—to play with math concepts while they enjoy the natural world and take a break from computer screens.

The creative, hands-on learning ideas below were written by our colleagues at organizations across the USA and around the world. The complete directions for each activity—and hundreds of others—are available in our free, online set of outdoor Activity Guides. These books were originally written for use in schoolyards around the world, but many of the ideas they include are equally well-suited for use close to home, in our backyards and neighborhoods. We hope you will have fun with them and will share these ideas widely!

Click here to download the books!

Green Schoolyards America and our partners at the International school grounds alliance publish a set of free, downloadable books filled with ideas for outdoor learning, play, and health. This set of 250 hands-on activities and curriculum ideas were contributed by 188 organizations across the USA and around the world. CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THE BOOKS.

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This article is the second installment in our series entitled, Bringing Outdoor Learning Home.
Click here to read Part 1: Explore Art in Your Backyard or Neighborhood.

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Part 2: EXPLORE MATH outdoors, close to home

IMAGE © Chippewa nature center - Preschool

Springtime Math with Worms

Author: Rachel A. Larimore Consulting,
Midland, Michigan, USA
Ages: 3-5 years old

Spring evokes images of tulips, bursting tree buds, frogs calling, puddles… and worms! Children’s interest in worms is a great opportunity to extend play to include math exploration and learning.
— See Living Schoolyard Activity Guide, page 147

IMAGE © SukHprit kaur

Counting is Fun!

Author: Centre for Environment Education,
Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India
Ages: 4-7 years old

Explore colors, textures, and materials found in nature, while helping young children learn to count and understand the meaning of numbers.
— See International School Grounds Month Activity Guide, page 98

IMAGE © Juliet robertson

Tens Frame Symmetry

Author: Creative STAR Learning,
Inverurie, Scotland, United Kingdom
Ages: 5-7 years old

In this activity, children use natural materials to create symmetrical patterns that build upon what they have observed in the world around them.
— See International School Grounds Month Activity Guide, page 150

IMAGE © Maria taylor

The Nature of Arrays

Author: Nature Play SA,
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Ages: 5-12 years old

Explore multiplication and division concepts, and practice problem solving and reasoning skills, by arranging natural materials into sets called arrays.
— See International School Grounds Month Activity Guide, page 149

IMAGE © sharon danks

Robert’s Little Finger

Author: Naturskolan i Lund, Lund, Sweden
Ages: 6-11 years old

This activity teaches ratios and collaboration, as children work together to construct a scale model of a member of their group. At home, this idea can include siblings and/or parents.
— See International School Grounds Month Activity Guide, page 70

IMAGE © naturskolan i lund

The Secret Picture

Author: Naturskolan i Lund, Lund, Sweden
Ages: 5-18 years old

Use this enjoyable game to help children improve their vocabulary for mathematical and spatial terms, and concepts such as “over,” “under,” and “below.” At home, play this game with family members.
— See International School Grounds Month Activity Guide, page 69

IMAGE © California coastal commission

Blue Whale: An Animal of Unusual Size

Author: California Coastal Commission,
San Francisco, California, USA
Ages: 10-18 years old

Blue whales are the largest animals known to have lived on Earth. Could a blue whale fit in your schoolyard—or backyard? Learn to measure the height of a tree in your yard, and compare it to the length of a blue whale.
— See Living Schoolyard Activity Guide, page 154

IMAGE © Education outside

Calculate Rainwater Runoff

Author: Education Outside and San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, San Francisco, California, USA
Ages: 10-18 years old

In this activity, students in dry climates determine how many gallons of rainwater can be captured from their rooftop and stored in a cistern. These calculations work equally well for thinking about a school or home rooftop.
— See Living Schoolyard Activity Guide, page 166

Winter Schoolyard Explorations

What can you do in your schoolyard in the winter, when snow is on the ground and tree branches are bare? Sooooo many things, with children of all ages! We would like to invite you and your school to bring your students outside for hands-on learning all winter!

Our Living Schoolyard Activity Guide has an abundance of ideas to help you get started, contributed by organizations across the USA. Click here to download your free copy of this engaging online book which includes the full directions for each of the ideas mentioned below, and more than 200 other activities that can be used year-round.

Try the activities below when snow is on the ground and temperatures are below freezing!

Photo: Shari Wilson

Tree Wonder

Author: Project Central, Kansas City, Kansas
Ages: 5-9 years old

Take your class outside when tree branches are bare in the winter. Spend time observing the branch structure of different types of trees, measure the angles between branches, and record observations with annotated drawings.
— See page 31 for directions.

Photo: Sharon Danks

Frozen Schoolyard Art Gallery

Author: Green Schoolyards America,
Berkeley, California
Ages: 3-7 years old

Collect interesting natural elements from the schoolyard landscape, and freeze them inside small disks of ice to create a temporary schoolyard art gallery.
— See page 40 for directions.

Photo: Matt McKay

Team Building:
The Amazing Winter Race!

Author: Wisconsin Green Schools Network,
Columbus, Wisconsin
Ages: 10-18+ years old

In this activity, students work on team cooperation and fuel their competitive spirit as they race through winter group challenges, including: the sled pull, a five-man snowshoe walk, a GPS sprint, and a snowball throwing competition.
— See page 74 for directions.

Photo: Learning by Nature

Subnivian Explorations

Author: Learning by Nature, Bozeman, Montana
Ages: 8-12 years old

In this science activity, students dig a snow pit to investigate the space in and under the snow-pack. They carefully excavate layers of snow to learn more about winter weather patterns and the wildlife, plants, and people who interact with snow.
— See page 163 for directions.

We hope you have a good time in the snow! Please write to us at info(at)greenschoolyards.org and share photos of your winter schoolyard adventures.

Learning Takes Flight in Green Schoolyards

Photo by Shirl Buss

Green Schoolyards America was honored to feature the work of our esteemed colleague, Susan Humphries, MBE, MA, at a two-day conference in the San Francisco Bay Area on September 27-28, 2019. Ms. Humphries traveled from England to share her expertise in teaching methods based on hands-on outdoor experiences and a deep understanding of both child development and the natural world. The conference included 12 hands-on workshops that explored Ms. Humphries educational philosophy and her amazingly creative, engaging curriculum ideas.

This article is the second in a series intended to share what we learned from Susan Humphries during her visit, and focuses on activities we explored that relate to birds and the magic of flight.

Properties of Feathers

Several workshops offered at the conference focused on the physical properties of feathers and the ways that they interact with the air to help birds fly. These hands-on curriculum lessons blended scientific investigation techniques with play and visual art in a manner designed to spark curiosity and hold students’ interest.

In one workshop, conference participants explored the structure of feathers by looking closely at a wide variety of small pin feathers, selected for their beautiful colors and patterns. Participants identified the central shaft (quill), parallel barbs, and smaller filaments (barbules) that “zip” together to create a flat, smooth surface on each feather, designed to catch the wind and help birds generate lift. They also deconstructed their feathers to understand more about them.

susan Humphries teaches the workshop

Participants examined many feathers

Feather detail showing barbs & barbules

Another workshop examined the ways that feathers move in the air by trying a series of activities with different types of feathers and feather-filled pillows. Participants experimented with casting small amounts of tiny feathers into the air to watch the breeze carry them. Then, they worked with a partner to see if they could direct a single (small) feather’s flight, using air currents they generated with their breath or their hands. Next, participants tried balancing long peacock feathers in the palm of their hand, compensating for the light breeze blowing across the playground—as shown in the video below.

The workshop participants also experimented with the ways that feather-filled pillows interact with the air, by tossing a pillow to one another as they stood in a circle. The feathers inside the pillow slow its speed as it travels, and the pillow makes a nearly silent landing when it is caught or dropped.

Participants tossed a feather pillow in the air to observe how the feathers contained inside helped to slow the object’s movement.

Experiential History

Susan Humphries’s educational philosophy includes an experiential approach to teaching history. Many of her lessons make history come alive for children using hands-on experiences with ordinary aspects of life that were more common in past centuries. Two of our workshops explored this idea through our theme of birds and flight—while also providing windows into “cutting edge communications technology” of the past.

In one workshop, participants learned traditional writing techniques using a turkey quill. Each person trimmed their own quill to have a suitable writing point and then used their new feather pen with red and black ink to practice drawing pictures and writing text. Indelible inks and feathers like these were used to write important documents such as the Magna Carta and everything else—from bills of sale, to laws, and letters—in past centuries.

Cutting a suitable writing point on a turkey feather quill

Using a turkey quill pen to practice writing, with red ink

Using a turkey quill pen to practice writing

Homing pigeons were also one of the fastest ways to send a message over long distances in the centuries before planes, trains, automobiles, telephones, and computers. When they traveled, people would bring pigeons from their coop at home with them on their journey, and then release them with tiny messages tied to their legs when they reached their destination or had another important idea to communicate with friends, family, and colleagues.

At the end of the first day of our conference, we were grateful to have pigeon expert Bill Milestone join us with a delightful flock of pigeons he raises at his home in San Francisco. After teaching us about his pigeons, conference attendees released them so that they could fly back home, across San Francisco Bay.

Releasing pigeons with children at their school presents a wide range of potential curriculum ties including:

• geography lessons, tracing the start and end points of the pigeons’ journey

• the history of communication technology

• flight aerodynamics

• biological homing mechanisms of birds

• animal husbandry and training techniques

Releasing pigeons also presents opportunities to teach empathy and spark wonder, while having an enjoyable experience in a very memorable way. The video below shares the magical moment of our pigeon release at the conference.

Pigeons and doves in art

As Susan Humphries tells us, "The affinity between people and birds goes back centuries and still resonates today. Pigeons and doves, in particular, appear in artwork across cultures around the world, in both secular and religious contexts.”

In our workshop activity on this theme, participants explored the ways that pigeons and doves have been represented in art, and then tried their hands at making their own artwork that included birds. During the workshop they drew large scale, colorful chalk pictures of birds on the schoolyard’s asphalt, and wove peace doves into the chainlink fence using strips of cloth.

Photos above by Shirl Buss and Green Schoolyards America

We hope that this interdisciplinary exploration of birds will inspire you to try some of these lessons at your own local school. Please send us photos to share your work!

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Detailed descriptions of each of the workshops described in this article are included in a free online book Green Schoolyards America created with Susan Humphries entitled, Experiential Outdoor Learning in the Schoolyard. Please visit our schoolyard activity webpage to download your own copy.

For detailed directions about how to implement the bird-related lessons described above, please see pages 6, 7, 10, and 17 of this new publication.