What is OPAL?

Outdoor Play and Learning

It has long been recognised that play is fundamental to a child’s health, happiness, development and well-being. Research has also shown that children spend 20% of their time in school playing. This led us to reflect upon how playtimes could be improved at Warboys Primary Academy and in the Spring term of 2024 our OPAL journey began.

The OPAL vision is that “every child in every school has an amazing hour of high-quality play every day with no exceptions” and as a school we share this vision and recognise the enormous benefits play has on a child’s life.

We have developed the OPAL approach and worked with our school community to improve our play provision. Our school grounds are a fantastic space with a large playground and a large field. Traditionally, some of these spaces have been underused. However, through our OPAL project, our school site is being developed to offer high-quality play experiences whatever the weather.

Our outdoor areas are continually being developed to offer an even wider range of play opportunities. The children love playing in all the different areas, including rolling in tyres, building with crates, creating dens, new recipes in the mud kitchen, creating games with small world toys or enjoying the scooters. They are having fun and are developing life skills of teamwork, problem-solving, communication, resilience whilst also developing their creativity and imagination.

Next OPAL parents meeting:

 > Parent Play - 20th January 2026 @ 13:30 - 15:00