Outdoor Therapy Ideas for Summer Sessions: Move, Play, and Learn Outside

Summer brings the perfect opportunity to take therapy sessions beyond the classroom walls. Whether you’re working during ESY or just preparing for the year ahead, integrating therapy into outdoor play can refresh your approach and your students’ motivation. Check out these outdoor therapy ideas for the Summertime!

Sidewalk Chalk Obstacle Courses

Use chalk to draw paths, shapes, numbers, and prompts on the pavement. Include tasks like hopping on one foot, crawling, spelling a name, or saying a target word each step.

Skills Targeted:

• Gross motor coordination (jumping, balance, bilateral movement)
• Motor planning
• Visual-motor integration
• Expressive language (labeling, sequencing)
• Executive functioning (following multi-step directions)

Nature-Themed Scavenger Hunts

Create a sensory or language-rich checklist of items to find: something rough, something that smells good, something green, etc. Add movement tasks between items for extra engagement.

Skills Targeted:

• Sensory processing
• Language development (describing, categorizing, comparing)
• Attention and self-regulation
• Problem solving and flexible thinking

Therapy Picnics

Invite students to help set up a picnic outdoors. Use pretend food or simple snacks and involve them in tasks like carrying items, setting up, labeling foods, or initiating conversation.

Skills Targeted:

• Fine motor skills (grasping, opening containers)
• Social communication (requesting, turn-taking, topic maintenance)
• Daily living skills
• Articulation or vocabulary goals through themed play

Water Play and Relay Games

Set up sponge tosses, watering can walks, or target games using buckets and chalk circles. Water play can be very regulating and easy to adapt across skill levels.

Skills Targeted:

• Strength and endurance
• Core stability and posture
• Body awareness
• Following directions
• Sensory regulation

Outdoor Therapy is Purposeful Play

Outdoor therapy is more than a change of scenery; it’s a powerful way to promote whole-child development. Summer sessions should feel engaging, supportive, and aligned with each student’s IEP or service goals.

By moving therapy outside, we give students the chance to learn in new ways and remind ourselves of the joy and creativity our profession brings!

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