Our week in the forest

At the beginning of the week we made a scarecrow. We provided the children with straw, sticks and old clothes. The children used felt tips to draw on the scarecrows face. Some of the children walked around the meadow taking turns to carry and look after the scarecrow.

“This is our forest baby.”

When we go on adventures we love to find logs and trees we climb and jump off. The children found a tree stump which they took turns jumping off. Whilst jumping off one of the practitioners was asking the children,
“Are you ready?” thereafter a child replied,

“I was born ready.”

We made kites out of paper, sticks, and wool. Although there wasn’t enough wind for the kites to fly, the children were quiet amused with dragging the kites across the floor in the meadow. Most of the children took their kites home to fly. We hope there’s enough wind over the weekend for the children to fly their kites. Keep us updated and feel free to post pictures on Tapestry.

We did some painting using the main colours we see in autumn time. We used the colours red and yellow and then compared the colours to the leaves on the ground. The practitioner present talked about the changes that happen in the forest during autumn. This prompted a conversation about personal understandings of what changes the children had already seen.

On Thursday, we went on an insect hunt. Two of our children spotted two slugs! They watched the slugs move across the log and decided to name them both. So we had two slugs, one named Freddie and the other named Jose. We spoke about the different body parts on the slug and in particular the tentacles.

“They use their tentacles to see things. Like we have eyes and they have eyes too!”

There has been quite a bit of interest shown towards dragons recently. On our Friday adventure, the children found a log which they wanted to transform into a dragon. They took sticks and pushed them into the holes in the log.

“I want to make a dragon”

“Look this is the face, I made the face.”

After the children had created their dragon, they chose to fight it! Using swords (sticks) they had found in the surrounding area.

Next Week in the Forest

We have more autumn activities on the agenda for next week. In the forest there are also loads of chestnuts. We have thought of some games we can play using chestnuts and will introduce these to the children.

Parents Evening
We have our very first parents evening coming up on the week commencing 24th October. I have sent out a link so that you may book time slots. Please let me know if you haven’t received this.

Feedback on emails
We are now using a tablet to record the children’s day so that we can send you feedback via emails. This gives parents and practitioners a chance to talk about how the children are and what they’ve enjoyed doing during their time in the forest.

A guide as to what children should wear:

One pair of comfortable trousers
One long sleeve shirt
One jumper/fleece
One pair of thermal socks
Wellies
Waterproofs

Please make sure your children have fleeces in their bags as the weather gets unpredictably cold.

Upcoming Calendar Events

Half Term: 24th-28th October - Book half term holiday camps
Halloween Spook-tacular Party: Friday 28th October - Book now
Parent’s Evening: W/C 24th October (please see emails)
Nafisa annual leave: 8th – 16th November
Christmas Party: Monday 19th December in Wimbledon