Students from BA Childhood Practice, MEd Early Years, PGDE and PhD Education attended sessions at the Mucky Boots Kindergarten, set within the woodland in Maryculter, to develop their own professional practice and learn more about an outdoor teaching approach.
Mucky Boots offers an inspiring, child led environment with holistic and nurturing approaches. Children are given the opportunity to develop socially, emotionally and academically within the natural world as upwards of 80% of the day is spend outdoors, all year round. Dawn Ewan founded the Kindergarten, the first of its kind in Aberdeenshire, following her training and work as a Forest School Leader.
The sessions were organised due to student request and funded by the Development Trust Students Support Fund. Students were given the opportunity to explore learning and play potentials in the outdoor environment, blank spaces, preparing for outdoor learning in any space, basic planning and risk assessments, risky play, schemas and the benefits of outdoors and nature on learning and development.