Golden Seeds

YES! Babies need outdoor play

Positive outdoor play experiences are part of Golden Seeds’ quality program designed for babies and toddlers.

Research has shown that young children benefit from natural outdoor play. As babies learn from exploring their world by seeing, touching, hearing and smelling, engaging in sensory activities is critical for their brain growth, cognitive development, and overall wellbeing. Spending time outdoors provides them with unique encounters with new sensations, breathing fresh air, feeling the breeze that’s touching their face, the smell of the garden after rain, grasping crunchy dry leaves and flowers, experiencing different weather patterns. Babies also have more opportunities to move around freely, kicking their legs and extending their arms in an open space which can all support their physical development.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends children under 1 year to have at least 30 minutes of tummy time spread throughout the day. For children aged 1-2 years, spending at least 180 minutes spread throughout the day in various types of activities.

At Golden Seeds, we respond to children’s developmental needs and carefully plan young children’s routines from research evidence. We always ensure to provide young children with outdoor playtime and encourage them to appreciate our natural world.

Safety Considerations

Golden Seeds always ensures young children’s safety is always a priority. When providing outdoor experiences, obstacles that may cause injuries are always removed and objects are always checked for safety purpose before we offer them to children. As mouthing is one of the predominant ways a young child may explore an object with, any ‘small’ objects offered to children need to be assessed and passed as a safe object for them to explore. Ensuring upmost safety for children at all times.

Sun smart practices are also embedded in our daily practice. Outdoor play time always happens when it is not the hottest part of the day, and ensures babies under 12 months always have shade, and wear loose-fitting protective clothing and hats during play. Depending on the weather, layers of clothing are removed or added.

How do we promote learning and development in outdoor experiences?

  • Encouraging babies to explore the natural environment, and touching grass, sand or leaves can help strengthen their immune system.
  • Providing objects to facilitate the development of fine and gross motor skills, as well as objects to grasp, reach, push, and pull.
  • Create verbal exchanges that share a genuine interest in what babies are exploring, describing what they are touching and seeing in the environment, and respond by repeating the sound they make.
  • Offering containers and boxes for children to take things in and out.
  • Set up a developmentally appropriate and safe obstacle course for young children to crawl around in different directions, such as with soft paddings and pillows.

Outdoor play can also be paramount in supporting babies’ sense of identity and belonging. Through making continuous new discoveries from nature, they develop a strong foundation for life-long curiosity in exploring. Strong relationship is a key part of our philosophy, and we believe through engaging in outdoor learning together with children, there can be endless opportunities to build warming and trusting relationship.

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