Plant pots, pirate ships, paint and a peg!
On the Magpies team this week, we have been planting some wildflower and cress seeds. The children chose to use either their hands or a scoop to get the soil and fill up their pots or recycled tubs. Leaving a little bit of room at the top, they carefully placed the seeds inside, tucked them in with some soil and used the watering can to sprinkle some water on top! The children were very excited to see their plants grow there and then...wouldn’t it be great if seeds became fully grown plants in a day. It sparked some lovely conversations about time and growth. Looking up to the sky some wished that their plants would grow as tall as some of the trees near our site. To accompany our gardening theme, some books were brought to site explaining how plants and flowers grow. The hungry caterpillar and a worm story were shared as well which the children all showed interest in... worms are as usual a popular thing to find under logs here!
The children’s own interests this week have revolved around cooking and baking and game playing - there was a bean bag toss and a hurdling championship! In the mud kitchen, pieces of bark with rough jagged edges were used as salmon with delicious crispy skin...cooked on the BBQ to perfection! The head chef went around to make sure there was enough for everyone to try! Colourful bean bags were used in our games this week, being thrown into circles drawn in the ground. If the children got them into the circles they used stick pencils to keep a tally of how many points they had scored!
To end the week on the magpies, the children found a peg stuck hard into the ground near one of the rainbow ribbons. Lucy the gardener gave the children a spade and they used it to dig up the peg. It took a lot of huffing, puffing and heaving but eventually out came the peg! It was a great opportunity for team working skills and problem solving as the group spent time thinking of the best ways to get the peg out of the ground.
The robins have been travelling to different countries by train, aeroplane and car! Our benches are such a tool for the children’s imagination to run wild. They turn the benches upside down and suddenly they are in a speed car on the motorway. Sometimes, they drag the benches around the site and make a long train going to a faraway land, or Richmond!
The robins love to engage in role play and this week they were so involved in team work! The children started talking about boats and pirate ships so inevitably, some of them started collecting planks and ropes and rolling logs across the forest to put the ideas into practice! The joy of playing and exploring whilst learning is such a delight to witness in the forest. The younger children helped decorate the pirate ship while the older children worked on the right position of each plank and each log. When the children started putting ropes around the logs and on the pallets, they realised that they needed to have proper knots to keep the pieces together. They even made a boat steering wheel, and the captain took them to a lovely island for lunch!
Seeing some of the three year olds doing those knots by themselves and teaching their friends how to do them was amazing! The robins are learning the value of team work and team effort.
The robins have been interested in worms for the past few months and we have been talking about worms a lot! They know how to carry them gently and put them back in a safe place so they don’t get hurt accidently. We have been reading about worms and seeing how they move and how they like to stay under logs to leave their tracks!
Books are always a hit with our robins. Our children love spending hours looking at the pictures, reading to each other or asking a teacher to read them a story.
On Thursday, we had a bit of rain so the robins really enjoyed playing in the mud kitchen! From digging rocks of different shapes and sizes, to transport water from puddle to puddle, they really made the most of it!
We hope you all have a lovely weekend!
Little Forest Folk
Fulham