It’s starting to get nice and chilly here in the forest! Luckily, we have a ready supply of hand warmers for little fingers that are feeling cold and the children enjoy helping to shake them up to activate the cosy heat.
Although we stop providing water specifically to play, the puddles and damp mud mean that gloves become wet very quickly so we ask that everyone could have a few spare pairs inside their back packs so we can swap whenever needed through the day. The best are the simple, stretchy gloves because the children can soon learn to help put them on themselves and the design encourages them to keep their gloves on their hands because their dexterity and sense of touch is not hindered by bulky layers. We encourage the children to help as much as possible with independently dressing and undressing out of their winter layers and it is always fantastic to hear the words “I can do it!” as they set about pulling sleeves the right way out and having a try at doing a zip.
The Robins have been focussing on literacy this week by singing the Days of the Week song and then trying to think of words that start with the same letter of the day they are on. One group made a cake in the mud kitchen and covered it with pink chalk dust and Karen helped them sing a song to “Puff Puff Puff out the candles on the Pink Ping Pick cake!” they all really enjoyed this playing with words and took turns to puff out the candles each time they sang.
The Magpies played with some literacy card games to help match and learn letter shapes to spell simple three letter words and wowed us with their concentration and enthusiasm to keep trying new ones. Harriet created an activity based around that favourite story “We’re going on a Bear Hunt” and the children focused on learning the B for Bear and H for Hunt which was a fantastic way of capturing their interest and incorporating this learning in a way that felt fun.
A den on the Robin’s side soon evolved into a Dinosaur Museum and the children were so excited to look for treasures, fossils and bones in the ground to dig up and put on display inside. They joined in with sounding out letters as the sign was written on the outside and clearly enjoyed the process of working on something, they had decided was very important.
On top of all this fun we have been dancing, jumping, balancing, climbing and running to fill our waterproofs with warmth and the forest with laughter. On both sides the ever-popular game of capture a teacher has been played where the children chase one of our educators all over site, dodging around trees, hopping over logs and darting back and forth to change direction and before gleefully catching them and taking them to jail! Apart from simply being fantastically fun, this is also a great game for really building up stamina and core strength (in the children and educators!) by encouraging movement over such varied terrain.
It’s been an incredibly fun week and we’re all excited to recharge our batteries over the weekend so we can have just as much fun next week!
Little Forest Folk
Fulham