Loose parts are attractive and captivating objects that children can combine, construct, take apart, carry and design with no specific instructions for use. They invite conversations and collaboration with each other that lead to positive social development, creativity, and critical thinking. In an outdoor setting, loose parts may be leaves, sticks, rocks, sand, dirt, water, etc. Children may engage in symbolic play in which a branch with leaves may become a broom, create elaborate patterns like a mandala, or experiment with physics when building a tower of tree cookies. Loose parts allow a child to learn all areas of a typical classroom curriculum while playing outdoors in a fun, hands-on environment.

Math: Children manipulate loose parts while learning about math at the same time. Some topics a child might learn about include sorting, patterns, measurement, spatial awareness, counting, conservation, and geometric shapes.

Physical Science: Loose parts help children learn about the scientific method as children make a hypothesis about the outcome of an action and then test it to see if they are correct. Children experiment with physics when creating towers and inclines, leading to discoveries about gravity, weight, and distance.

Dramatic and symbolic play: Children may use loose parts in creative ways that most adults may never think of. For example, I have had students use sticks and stones to create a town, bushes became a house, a large branch became a pony. Groups of children may collaborate and play together. In order for the game to work, children must learn to compromise and use other social skills.

Language and Literacy: Loose parts promote language development when children use them to tell a story or to interact with other children. This leads to increased vocabulary, memory and literacy.

Art: Loose parts in a natural environment may invite a child to use a stick to draw in the mud, sculpt mud or clay, create a mosaic of stones, or arrange shells in a spiral.

Sensory exploration: Nature is full of opportunities to explore the senses in nature. Walking barefoot in the mud, rubbing the rough bark of a tree, listening to a bee buzzing, watching an ant on a leaf, smelling the sweet smell of jasmine flowers, tasting some juicy wild blackberries.