Scottish Outdoor Learning Festival 2007
Overview of the festival from Willie White
The first Scottish Outdoor Learning Festival was a great success. Thank you to all that attended. The feedback we have received is very positive: 99 per cent enjoyed the conference, 97 per cent thought the conference met its aims and 96 per cent thought we got the balance of the day right. Not bad with over 500 people in attendance.
Initial feedback from the seminars included: excellent presenters and chairpersons, high quality, amazing range of experiences being made available across Scotland and beyond; 96 per cent thought the seminars were informative and interesting. Inevitably, when the weather brightened up some people drifted to outdoor seminars and attendance at indoor seminars dropped. Had it rained I’m sure the drift would have gone the other way.
What an exhibition, what a buzz throughout the hall! I was amazed at the bulging carrier bags full of free resources that delegates were taking back to school but more impressive was the staggering depth of outdoor learning expertise in the one place at the one time. The keynotes and closing speeches showed central government's belief in the importance of outdoor learning in children and young people’s education and emphasised both HMIE and LTS’s commitment to make these experiences more available to all.
Yours sincerely,
Key presentations
Here you can find links through to some of the key presentations and seminars.
| Speaker | Seminar |
|---|---|
| Kate Coutts | Rainbow Light School - RME and health outdoors at Unst Primary School |
| Margaret Cowie | Art and Design and the Outdoors |
| Kenny Grahame | Outdoor learning in Balnacraig, an evolution |
| John W Hamilton | Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) |
| Dan Hill | Dark skies - Starting astronomy with your groups |
| Donnie Macleod | Factors of quality learning outdoors |
| Tom Nisbett | It's special outdoors |
| Anne Patterson | Maths and other curricular developments outdoors at Inverary Primary School |
| Matt Roche | Ocean Youth Trust and East Ayrshire Council |
| Nigel Scriven | Hop-out - Primary Environmental Education Programme |
| David Spence | Enterprise Education and Outdoor Learning |
| Steve Tilling | Learning from the London challenge residentials' experience |
| Claire Warden | Demo of Mindstretchers early years learning pathways |
List of exhibitors
_tcm4-396341.jpg "Pupils outdoors")
List of exhibitors
Information on the exhibitors who showed outdoor learning for the amazing breadth and depth of experience that it was.