The aim of the Kindergarden visit was to allow us a veileaders, to take part in the observation of how Norwegian pre-schools differ to school from our own countries and to understand how outdoor activities are incorporated into their education from such an early age.

The 22 of us were split into two groups and we attended 2 different schools. All 11 of us arrived together at Presteheia Kindergarden at the meeting time of 9.15am where we were met by the leader. Presteheia is a school with 115 places & the children are divided into groups of age: 1 – 3 and 3 – 5. The leader introduced us to the group of 14 3 – 5 year olds which we would be observing. Most of the children knew very little English so the communication between us was done mostly by body language and facial expressions.

The children’s day began by going into the local forrest, they do this everyday until 2pm no matter what the weather conditions are like. All children were dressed appropriately for the cold windy day ahead and they all carried their own backpacks containing a meal for the day. When walking to the forrest the children were able to show us the way sensibly although they were really excited for us to be there. The children were able to run ahead of the group as they liked but were all conscious when approaching a road or slowed down when they were too far ahead of the group.

In the area there was a place for the children to leave their bags and then they were free to do as they liked, i noticed that this was a big difference to the schools at home, as there is usually a learning outcome for the day and even the free play time involved a more organised approach. It was good to see the children interact with each other and they had already made some play apparatus previously. All children were taking part in something active, even the quieter ones seemed happy walking around the forest or climbing trees alone.

The children were really creative when involving in fantasy play and spent most of the time using sticks as swords and chasing both other children and us internationals around the area! A small group or boys and girls were confidently climbing a high tree, the staff were okay with this until they got near the top – even then the staff just said to the children ‘lower’ and they were responsible enough to know they had reached their limits and return down without being told twice. Again this is very different to our schools, the staff would be worried about the children hurting themselves so they wouldn’t be allowed to climb anything, not allowing them to take their own risks.

After a few hours a member of staff gathered the group together and they sang songs – everyone joined in and they were excited to show us what they knew, whilst another member of staff prepared a fire and sausages for the lunch.

Around the fire there was a marked circle of stones, and without anyone telling us we were aware that this was the area the children should not pass – this was evident straight away as hey all followed this rule. It is clear to me that the children here are given a lot more independence and responsibility than children are in schools from the UK, it has been proven today that this has had a positive outcome on their safety and healthy risk taking – the children knew their own limits but still enjoyed pushing themselves and taking risks.