What the schoolyard movement adds is the possibility of blending play and teaching. There's no reason learning shouldn't be fun. For the best results, students have to be involved from the beginning, defining and creating their own environment and recreating it every day, as humans are destined to do. For starters, it facilitates most of what we call the educational reform agenda. An ongoing outdoor project such as a garden provides a context that the class can return to again and again, providing continuity.
Interdisciplinary teaching comes naturally, as do team projects.
Instead of the adult having to have all the answers, they instead model how to be a learner. When the schoolyard truly becomes an extension of the classroom, teachers move easily among indoor and outdoor activities, bringing in samples to study under the microscope, generating ideas for library research, reading stories that illuminate our relationship with nature, or collecting data to share on the Internet. Beyond the Curriculum Equally important to teachers are the meta-curricular benefits of schoolyard projects. Put more generally, the schoolyard provides opportunities for children with a wide range of learning skills. In Tuckahoe's Expedition Days, one emotionally troubled child gained a reputation as an artist and a bird expert.