Beach Classrooms

The south west's beautiful natural heritage, landscape and coastline is clearly a fantastic learning resource as well as a recreational one, but in recent years National Curriculum pressures and concerns over child safeguarding have meant that this resource has been relatively under-used by schools.

The Beach Classrooms programme, developed in a partnership between Cornwall Education Development Services, Creative Partnerships and three Advanced Skills Teachers, has worked to address these issues over the past 2 years through innovative partnership approaches to outdoor learning.

In summer 2004 the first three pilot projects were delivered with great success and a further fourteen schools were recruited to take the programme forward in a 'roll-out' phase in 2005-6.

Each school partnered up with an artist to investigate unique approaches to using their local beach as a 'classroom for a day', developing an engaging experience for teachers and children whilst also tackling the all important National Curriculum learning requirements and tricky health and safety issues.

Working in a diverse range of media including visual art, film, ceramics, textiles, photography, creative writing, drama and multimedia, the schools also focused on developing curricular evidence and other resources during the process.

Pauline Hannigan of Nancledra Primary School, who first piloted the scheme in 2004 along with St Newlyn East and St Stephen Churchtown Schools, says: 'The pilot was a lot of hard work, with a year of planning from September onwards, then something really got going in Cornwall which built the model for the schools working independently in collaboration with creative practitioners. It has set up a great framework that’s not set in stone but one that extends what you’re doing in partnership.'

Ed Whitelaw of Creative Partnerships says: 'The richness and diversity of the work shows the real sense of ownership the schools have taken through the project, and proves how ideas, when given space, time and support, can have fantastic results.'

In January 2007, a further Eden event run in association with the At Bristol Science Learning Centre put the project into a broader South West outdoor learning context and rolls the work out to a wider audience.

The Beach Classrooms programme aims to:

• Develop outdoor learning practice
• Link with the wider health agenda
• Develop connections to environment and heritage
• Explore creative approaches to science
• Develop cross-curricular learning and themed learning
• Foster a sense of place for young people
Encourage teacher engagement and develop leadership
• Promote real science