OUTDOOR PLAY AND LEARNING (OPAL)
Outdoor Play & Learning
Click on the link to see what our playtimes are like! St B's Playground
At St Bernard's we are committed to ensuring quality play opportunities are available to all our children. As a result of this, part of our school development plan involves us engaging in an exciting project with OPAL (Outdoor Play & Learning). The OPAL programme provides us with a mentor who works closely with the school in order to support us in enhancing and developing our play opportunities. OPAL is all about using natural and man-made resources to allow children to be inspired and creative at playtime.
At St Bernard's we believe play has many benefits, including:
- Play is critical to children's health and wellbeing, and essential for their physical, emotional, social, spiritual and intellectual development.
- Play enables children to explore the physical and social environment, different concepts and different ideas.
- Play enhances children's self-esteem and their understanding of others through freely chosen social interactions, within peer groups, with individuals, and within different groups of different ages, abilities, interests, genders, ethnicities and cultures.
- Play requires ongoing communication and negotiation skills, enabling children to develop a balance between their right to act freely and their responsibilities to others.
- Play enables children to experience a wide range of emotions and develop their ability to cope with these, including sadness and happiness, rejection and acceptance, frustration and achievement, boredom and fascination, fear and confidence.
- Play encourages self-confidence and the ability to make choices, problem solve and be creative.
- Play maintains children's openness to learning, develops their capabilities and allows them to push the boundaries of what they can achieve.