Our Week in the Forest...
As the big day approaches our children have been sharing all their recent festive experiences; visiting Father Christmas; seeing houses twinkling with Christmas lights; toasting marshmallows with Marlon at the Christmas party; who they are going to visit next week and what they have written on their Christmas list… after all, the elves have definitely been seeing plenty of children playing beautifully together this year!
Following on from some of our storytelling last week, the children have been incorporating many ideas into their role playing, discoveries and activities throughout the week. The ‘White Owl’ was definitely a popular theme with some children colouring leaves white and using these as the white owl’s feathers, whilst others wanted to make owls to hang on their Christmas trees. So, putting together their expertise in using our forest tools and endless creativity, they transformed our simple tree cookie into something new... drilling two holes for the feet, a hole for the string, gently tapping in the Dowling, a design for the face, some cutting of felt for wings, a bit of gluing.... Then up into the trees they flew one by one waiting for their new homes among the Christmas lights and baubles.
Our Christmas stories this week included the delightful book ‘Jo-Jo and Gran-Gran, Twelve and a Half Days of Christmas’. A story in which Jo-Jo and her gran plan to do something special on each day leading up to Christmas. The children loved the storyline and started to ask about how many days there were until Christmas and discuss what sort of things they would do if they were Jo-Jo. There were some great ideas with a real forest themed favourite being, “Having a worm party!”.
Clay has remained a regular feature in the forest, allowing the children to further develop their pot making skills. Jo showed them how to make a pinch pot and a coil pot and they practiced these, creating some amazing pots and bowls. Some children had even more ambitious ideas! After searching on the internet for a catapult, they carefully moulded their clay to make the component parts in order to create one.
During the week, some of the children noticed a watch one of the educators was wearing. This led to loads of talk about time and what different types of watches you can have, we never realised there were so many! The children had amazing ideas of a watch that could shoot baddies, a Dr Who watch that could transport you somewhere else, a watch that told you how fast you ran or even a watch that told you the time! This got everything thinking about having their own watches. One of the educators suggested using face paint to create watches, so each child chose what colour they wanted the face, the strap and the numbers and what time they wanted their watch to say. We also talked about the difference between watches with hands and digital watches, nice to see some of those retro 80’s digital watches making an appearance again.
It has been an another absolutely incredible year in the forest surrounded by such inspirational children. We are all looking forward to seeing our Little Forest Folk-ers again in the New Year and hearing all about their Christmas adventures.
Until then we wish you all a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year!
Little Forest Folk
Fulham