CYP Now - Special Report: Research: Outdoor Learning

The Council for Learning Outside the Classroom is a charity that promotes the opportunity for all children to experience life and lessons beyond the classroom as a regular part of growing up. It provides support on the ground, facilitating the sharing of best practice and promoting the benefits of outdoor learning for engaging children in education

Wilderness Schooling: A controlled trial of the impact of an outdoor education programme on attainment outcomes in primary school pupils

T Quibell, J Charlton, J Law, 2017

The attainment gap between high and low achieving children in the primary school years has a detrimental long-term effect on learning. Many initiatives have been introduced to close this gap. The Education Endowment Foundation and the Sutton Trust have developed a toolkit for schools which describes the most effective strategies for raising the attainment of disadvantaged pupils as those involving collaborative learning, feedback, mastery, meta-cognition and self-regulation. Translating these findings into realistic strategies to implement within school presents a challenge to many teachers and school leaders. These strategies, though, can be easily realised through outdoor learning, as has been shown in other studies into the beneficial impacts of this approach. However, most outdoor learning programmes are unstructured and evidence is anecdotal. This study explores the potential of using a structured six-day curriculum-based outdoor learning programme for primary school children – ‘Wilderness Schooling’ – to improve attainment and close the gap.

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