TAKE ME OUT

Let’s take learning outdoors!

Come and join us on the quest for creating the best educational programs for the early years and pre-school children. Through the international project TAKE ME OUT you can access materials focusing on outdoor learning and play to help meet your needs.

Why should it matter:

  • TAKE ME OUT brings together the newest teaching approaches relating to the outdoors from Scandinavia, the UK and other countries in Europe
  • Outdoor learning and play provides many benefits to all children
  • Early Years practitioners have a key responsibility for the wellbeing of children, and this project helps them to achieve this goal

What do the children get:

  • An increase in self-confidence
  • Better communication and social skills
  • More precise motor skills
  • Boosted motivation
  • Improved physical and mental health
  • More ways to boost their learning
  • Improved problem solving skills
  • Increased physical activity
  • Better creativity and imagination
  • A lot of discovery
  • A caring attitude towards nature and the environment

By joining in you get:

  • A handbook for Early Years practitioners on outdoor learning and play
  • Access to online training modules
  • A set of standards for Early Years outdoor practitioners
  • Practical ideas for outdoor activities
  • The option to join TAKE ME OUT WEEK
  • The option to join the TAKE ME OUT network
  • Contacts to other teachers using the outdoor learning and play approach
  • Lots of inspiration and, we hope, motivation to take your children outdoors in practice
  • The possibility to gain the International Early Years Outdoor Practitioner Award

Let’s join forces and build brighter and greener futures for our children and our planet!

GENERAL INFORMATION

Project TAKE ME OUT has been implemented in two phases, both with the support and co – financing from the European Union, ERASMUS+ program.

The first phase of the TAKE ME OUT project, contract number: 2016-1-SK01-KA201-022597, titled „Taking learning outdoors – Supporting the skills of pre-school teachers in outdoor education and care“, was implemented in the years 2016 – 2018 and brought the idea of implementing outdoor education and play in public kindergartens and early years settings across Europe. It focused on the promotion of outdoor approach and resulted in development of the first materials for teachers and pedagogues, who support the idea and who see the benefits of implementing it in practice. It also boosted the motivation of many and of all of us to continue!

The first project resulted in the following outputs:

  • Take me out Teachers Handbook
  • Professional Standards of outdoor education (focused on practitioners)
  • The first 4 Online training modules & Basic teacher training program
  • Activity ideas

Later, again thanks to the support of the European Union, ERASMUS+ programme.

The second phase of the project was  implemented, in the years of 2019 – 2022.

The project number 2019-1-SK01-KA201- 060775, titled “Taking learning outdoors – supporting the skills of pre – school managers in outdoor education and care – TAKE ME OUT II. –  Happy childhood happens outside – STEP HIGHER ”, reacted to the needs defined in the previous one and brought in new ideas again, that enabled development of other resources, that can, we hope, and wish, help you to implement the outdoor programs fully and enable to experience the benefits of outdoors to even more children across Europe!

The second project resulted in the following outputs:

  • Parents´guide to outdoor education in kindergarten
  • Standards of the outdoor education in kindergarten (focused on the institutional development)
  • 6 Online training modules & Training program for school leaders and managers
  • TAKE ME OUT WEEK campaign

You can find all these materials and/or infomation about the training programs and events that you can join on this website.

Welcome to join in!

Overall project focus:

Transferring of verified ECEC (Early Childhood Education and Care) teaching methodology, built on outdoor education concept, originated in and inspired by Scandinavian educational traditions, nowadays used in the UK and other EU countries, to countries, where this concept is less used and underdeveloped;

  • adapting outdoor approach for the use in the public early years settings, pre-schools or kindergatens to make it accessible for as many ECEC teachers, and, at the same time, reaching as many children as possible, in 5 project countries (SK, UK, DK, EE, CZ); as well as in all the other countries that express the interest to join
  • through developing project outputs fostering the skills of early years teachers, practitioners or pedagogues on outdoor education, supporting you in  implementation of outdoor education approach in practice;
  • developing additional motivational tools to encourage the use and implementation of this approach;
  • to support international cooperation in ECEC and developing thematic network focused on outdoor education, supporting the use of new teaching approaches and sharing of best practices in the sector of ECEC on European level.

The opinions presented on these websites are the views of the TAKE ME OUT project partnership and do not have to express the opinions of the EU.