A few words from the school: At Living Faith Lutheran Primary School, we are fortunate to have an eight-hectare site bordered by a creek, which means we are home to …

A few words from the school:

At Living Faith Lutheran Primary School, we are fortunate to have an eight-hectare site bordered by a creek, which means we are home to a host of local wildlife. One of our many play areas includes a relatively undeveloped open space called the “Nature Play” area. Students are encouraged to play with what they find in this space, such as sticks, rocks and sand. Thanks to community fundraising, we recently added a hut, water pump, creek bed, outdoor kitchen, and a conveyor belt. Along with our Adventure Playground (which promotes risky play), this space is one of the most popular for both play breaks and outdoor class learning.

One of our teaching staff reflected on a scene that played out in the Nature Play area recently, which is a perfect example of the benefits of such an area:

“I witnessed this first hand just the other day as I was on duty in the Nature Play Area. The newly constructed water play river was understandably getting a workout as the weather was warm. About ten students had been working together for several days to pull the rocks from the centre of the river to the side banks so that they could see the water flowing better. I was already pleased to see that the students working together were from a range of different year levels. As I stood closer to them, I overheard the conversation between two Year 2 students, a Year 4 student and a Year 5 student. They held a meaningful organic conversation about water pressure, the slope of the creek bed, and the water flow speed. The children experimented through play – watching as a leaf flowed down the creek and agreeing that the sloped section was flowing faster. Older students joined the conversation explaining that the slope was an angle and instructing the younger children about measuring it. They agreed that the slope was an acute angle because it was less than 90 degrees. As the bell rang, I overheard one of the Year 2 students tell his friend that he wanted to play in the river tomorrow so that they could look for more ‘cute’ parts of the river! The beautiful part of this little Maths and Physics lesson was that it happened naturally as part of creative, collaborative and unstructured play. These students were demonstrating multiple contemporary competencies including grit, reasoning, collaboration, initiative, communication and self-direction, just to name a few.”