In the Shade of Buildings: Innovative urban outdoor learning for secondary schools
How can the city become a classroom? In the Shade of Buildings turns urban green spaces into open learning environments where secondary school students observe biodiversity, map their neighbourhoods, learn from elders, andd take action for a more sustainable future.
The project responds to a growing gap between environmental awareness in curricula and students’ real relationship with their immediate environment. climate change and sustainability are often taught theoretically, disconnected from students’ daily urban reality. At the same time, schools report disengagement, eco-anxiety, and reduced wellbeing, particularly among adolescents who feel disconnected from nature and their local communities.
In the Shade of Buildings uses the city as a pedagogical resource. Instead of adding theoretical content, it provides a practical Outdoor Urban Learning Methodology and Digital Toolkit enabling teachers to implement structured walking routes, biodiversity mapping, intergenerational storytelling, and hands-on environmental activities.
What are the main objectives?
The overall objective of In the Shade of Buildings is to transform urban spaces into structured outdoor learning environments through a practical Outdoor Urban Learning Methodology and Digital Toolkit. These resources enable teachers and students to engage in activities such as walking routes, biodiversity mapping, intergenerational storytelling, and hands-on environmental learning, while strengthening environmental responsibility, key competences, and wellbeing through a transferable European framework.
Key objectives
- Develop key competences, including observation, critical thinking, creativity and collaboration through outdoor, inquiry-based activities and through digital tools in teaching experience.
- Promote pupils’ wellbeing, motivation and engagement by integrating regular outdoor learning in urban green areas.
- Encourage active eco-citizenship, environmental awareness and a culture of sustainable development within the school and the local community.
- Reimagine the city as a living, open learning space, enabling pupils, teachers and residents to (re)discover their urban environment from an educational and ecological perspective.
Who is this project for?
- Lower secondary school teachers (all subjects, with a focus on science, geography, languages, and environmental education)
- Lower secondary school students (aged 12–16)
- School leaders and non-teaching staff
- Environmental education centres and local sustainability actors
Local communities and families (indirect beneficiaries)
In the Shade of Buildings provides teachers with:
- Outdoor Learning Methodology Guide
A structured document explaining what outdoor learning is, its benefits and limitations, required preparations, student engagement strategies, and planning tips, as well as practical examples.
- Digital Toolkit
An interactive, easily accessible online toolkit allowing teachers to adapt activities to different contexts and curricula. It integrates 4 types of structured activities, with clear guidelines and at least 25 templates and resources:
- Educational walking routes
- Mapping urban nature
- Learning from elders
- Hands-on environmental activities
- City Explorers Projects
- City Explorers Projects
Teachers trained through the project’s transnational workshops will design and implement City Explorers projects with their students, applying the methodology and toolkit activities in real school contexts to explore urban green spaces, biodiversity, and climate-related challenges.
- Digital Hub & Urban Nature Story Map
All results, the Methodology Guide, Digital Toolkit, and City Explorer outputs, will be hosted on the In the Shade of Buildings Digital Hub, a multilingual open-access platform. An interactive Urban Nature Story Map will connect local student observations into a shared European digital space.
- Teacher Capacity Building and Walking Seminars
The project will introduce teachers and local people to these new tools through transnational teacher workshops and local dissemination events “Walking Seminars”.
Together with the MCE on this project…
- Études et Chantiers Corsica — France (Coordinator)
- Educational Centre for Environment and Sustainability (ECES) of Pramanta — Greece
- Gymnázium Sokolov a Krajské vzdělávací centrum — Czechia
- Advancis — Portugal
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.
