Outdoor activities are so vital to promote children’s whole development including gross and fine motor skills, intellectual skills, and social skills (Davies, 1996; Henniger, 1993). In this study, the researcher defines outdoor environments as school gardens since school gardens enhance considerable amount of facilities for children to play or discover and support their physical, cognitive, and social skills (Malone  and Tranter, 2003; Parsons, 2011).

Considering theoretical fundamentals of this research, Surplus Energy Theory is based on by the researcher. Surplus energy theory which is one of the strongest play theories in early childhood education is seen as most effective model since it accepts school gardens as environments for promoting children’s physical, social, and cognitive skills (Malone & Tranter, 2003).

In the literature, it is important to foster children’s whole development with outdoor activities and there are countless opportunities to achieve this aim in outdoor environments (Louv, 2005). Considering psychomotor development of children, Davies (1996) indicates that outdoor activities offer children making exercise, developing physical skills, and being active. With regard to cognitive development of children, Rivkin (2000) indicate the positive impacts of natural elements on children’s cognitive domain considering play in outdoors. He also highlights outdoor environments enhance children to observe what is going on in the environment including animals, weather, or construction and develop their cognitive skills. Regarding social development, outdoor environments offer many opportunities for children to know different people or animals (Rivkin, 2000) as well as to communicate and play with their peers (Creasey, Jarvis, & Berk, 1998).

Aforementioned benefits of outdoor activities for children could be achieved by teachers. In this regard, literature emphasizes that investigating teachers’ views regarding young children’s outdoor activities is necessary since teachers’ views have an impact on their practices and interactions with children during outdoor experiences (Wilcox-Herzog, 2002). However, there are only a very few studies dealing with teacher’s views about children’s outdoor activities (Chakravarthi, 2009). To illustrate, Chakravarthi, Hatfield, and Hestenes, (2009) develop a scale which name is Preschool Teachers’ Beliefs of Outdoor Play and Outdoor Environment. They reveal the relationship between teachers’ beliefs and their real practices about children’s outdoor play. Moreover, De Board, Hestenes, Moore, Cosco, and McGinnis (2005) develop Preschool Outdoor Environment Measurement Scale to evaluate both the physical and social facilities of outdoor environments for children.

As a result, a few number of existing scales focus on either teachers’ beliefs about outdoor activities and outdoor environments or the quality of outdoor environments by emphasizing children’s learning and play in those kinds of environments. In the current study, however, the researcher, of course, aims to understand teachers’ views about outdoor activities considering children’s learning and play, but most importantly she concentrates on the effects of outdoor activities on children’s development different from those studies. The research question of the study is:

What are preschool teachers’ views about young children’s outdoor activities considering their psychomotor, social and cognitive domains?

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