Our Week in the Forest...
At the beginning of the week the children set out on adventures for minibeasts. The rain meant lots of worms coming to the surface and the warmer weather even meant there was a bee out and about. The children celebrated together with each new discovery and shared with each other what they had found. These discoveries led to creating homes for the snails, woodlice, worms and slugs. The children foraged for natural resources to build insect houses. We had insect hotels, castles, dungeons and tents made from various materials; mud, sticks, stones, tree cookies and leaves were just a few of the resources the children used in constructing their creative buildings. Then they were superbly decorated, the children gave a lot of thought to their insect homes and they were very impressive. The children were excellent at presenting and explaining what they had built to their peers and very kind in letting them share the houses before setting off as a team to search for more insects.
Each morning this week we have walked through the walled garden and looked for the gardener’s cat, ran through the maze and observed the sprouting plants. The children asked lots questions such as ‘why are the plants in a house?’, ‘where is the cat’s dinner?’ and ‘what is that long spiky thing?’ showing lots of curiosity about their wonderful world around them. They showed a lot of interest in what the gardeners were doing, showing confidence in asking them questions and listen attentively to their responses.
Later in the week Little Forest Folk Holiday camp turned into survival camp as the children engaged with some imaginative play surrounding survival in the forest. The interest began with a conversation between two children climbing a tree. One child said ‘how fun is this?’ and the second responded ‘it isn’t about having fun it’s about surviving!’ This continued throughout the morning as we spoke about our five forest school rules and how they will help us survive in the forest such as ‘not eating poisonous berries’ and ‘don’t go in the crocodile river’. They used ropes in the tree to create escapes and look outs in order to protect their fort from the enemy. They took turns to go out to search for dinner being very careful not to get caught in the river with the crocodiles.
Towards the end of the week we were kindly given lots of logs and stumps which we look forward to using for obstacle courses, stepping stones and building materials in our next week of holiday camp.
Little Forest Folk
Fulham