Emergent Learning

Free Forest School’s Emergent Learning training and educational materials are supported by a generous grant from the VELA Education Fund.

Emergent learning is an approach to planning and teaching that relies on children’s interests, fascinations, and discoveries to inspire and drive the curriculum.

Example: Students find a bird nest on a walk outside and are excited about it! That discovery could lead to a hunt for loose parts on the ground to build their own nest, pretending to be baby birds, reading books about birds, or starting a bird watching observation log. With the support of the caregiver/teacher, the observed interest the children have in the nest creates additional opportunities for learning that nurture their interests and abilities.

Emergent learning can be practiced with children of all ages, by teachers, childcare providers, homeschool families, and by parents as they play with their children.

Emergent Learning Free Training

Emergent learning allows children and the environment to be co-creators of the curriculum. The benefits of this approach include:

1) It infuses joy into the learning process since the curriculum is grounded in what the kids are already interested in doing.

2) It centers play (in its many forms), which is not only fun for the kids, but is essential for early learning.

3) Designing the curriculum is simpler because it is responsive rather than completely pre-planned.

4) The process of letting kids follow their natural curiosities involves trusting and empowering them, which builds their confidence and willingness to try new things, experiment, problem solve, etc.

(You will need to be a member to access course. Sign up for free.)

Video Resources

What is Emergent Learning?

Learn more about what emergent learning means in practice and what happens when kids drive the curriculum for their own learning in this 13-minute video. You can also download the slides here.

Common Play Urges

Learn more about nine common childhood play urges and how you can support children as they engage with these urges in this 14-minute video. You can also listen to the audio-only version, or download the slides here. Learn more by following our #playurgeoftheweek series on Instagram.

Want to Learn More?

Emergent Learning on the Blog

Check out these articles from the Free Forest School blog which cover topics related to Emergent Learning:

• Meet Them Where They Are

• The Snail Shell Hunter: In Praise of Nature Collections

• Bringing the Classroom Outdoors: First Grade Learnings with Maria Villavicencio

• Learning and Growing Outdoors

• Heading Outside Without a Plan

• Nature Play Schema: Building Blocks for Crucial Brain Development

• Early STEM Skills at Free Forest School: How Nature Exploration is the Basis for Science Learning

• Learning to Play and Playing to Learn: A Parent-Educator’s View of Emergent Learning

Explore our other free mini courses

You can access training modules covering topics such as Basics of Outdoor Play and Raising Outdoor Kids.