Our Week in the Forest...
This week the children have explored lots of new and innovative ideas. They have taken their creativity to new heights using their collective knowledge, experience and skills to achieve shared goals! Given the freedom to think completely on their own and to learn through trial and error it always amazes us what the children are capable of.
To build their own obstacle course the children got together and worked in small groups of twos and threes to move large logs and planks. The children were setting their own challenges, deciding how high, how far and how wobbly the course could be before they tried to cross it. They gave each other encouragement when things were tricky and celebrated together when something awesome happened! This then developed as the children asked for ropes and the pallet. They then tied ropes independently to make their own climbing frame and jumping zone! This was a great test and allowed the children to explore taking turns, risk taking and developing their own safety instructions.
The climbing frame was then developed further and morphed into a special trap for baddies! They had ropes with hoops, a shooter and a special area to put the baddies. The trap also had sofa and television and was complete with camouflage so that the baddies couldn’t see!
At the large digging hole the children embarked on a new construction project where they built their own pirates area with balancing logs and even a plank. Many of the children spent a long time here shouting, “shiver me timbers” and “walk the plank”. When someone was made to walk the plank, they walked to the end of it and jumped into the shark infested waters in the giant hole below.
One morning we set up a tire swing but rather than swing on it the children quickly decided that the inside of the tire was an ice-cream shop! The shop sold ice-cream and purple sweets and was extremely popular, with customers consistently coming and going.
Every week in the forest we find a whole range of different mini beasts. This week the children decided to give one of them a name. George the slug! The children were determined to feed him and had long discussions about what he might like to eat. They tried mud, fallen leaves, sticks, cabbage from our garden, blackberries and mint. Whilst George seemed uninterested in all of these offerings, the children loved the taste of the mint so with the help of some of the educators they added some to their water bottles to create minty water to drink!
We are all super excited to be welcoming some new children to our wonderful Barnes family next week! Please do introduce yourselves to new families and welcome them into our Little Forest Folk community.
Little Forest Folk
Barnes