Our Week in the Forest...
Our second week of holiday camp has been such an exciting (although muddy) week in the forest and as always, the excitement levels from the children have been sky high. This week we were delivered some more logs and the children have loved using them for our pirate ship – when the cable reels were added these provided seats and a barrel for our mast to come out of. Face painting in the forest has also been extremely popular and along with lots of pirate face paints, jungle animals have been in abundance. We’ve seen tigers, lions, monkeys and jaguars crawling along our new assault course. The children walked along the logs using bits of rope to help them at various points; no longer is our usual tree swing good enough, but the expectations have now risen ever higher!
Scales have recently been introduced into our mud kitchen and the children have explored pouring mud, water, adding sticks, stones or even measuring the weight of some of our teapots. It was lovely to see how as one child was measuring the weight of his teapot, he explained to his friends how to use the scales and what they were showing. Tool work continues to be popular and the holiday campers love the opportunity to get involved. Our regular children are now perfect little role models, often telling the campers how we use the tools and how we stay safe. After having made necklaces, watches and bracelets, many children then went on to decorate their gadgets and gizmos with paint or crayons. Not only have we had tools, obstacles courses, face paints and pirate ships but we’ve had puddles, puddles and more puddles. Besides the thrill of splashing through them, some of our older children having been discussing the depth of them. We’ve compared how far up our welly boots or sticks the puddles go.
The highlight of the week was definitely the trip to Fulham Palace where, as a nursey we have sponsored 10 bricks that will be used in the refurbishments at the palace. The children were able to observe how the H G Matthews bricks were specially and locally crafted, using a range of different tools. The children then loved feeling the squishy, squidgy bricks once they had come out of there moulds. Along with seeing how the bricks are made, the children also got to sign their name on 10 bricks that will eventually become part of Fulham Palace. They were presented with 10 finished bricks and the children could see the differences between these ones that had been dried and cooked in a kiln and the squishy ones from earlier. Some of our younger children enjoyed scribbling on the bricks while some of our older children were able to have a go at writing their name. Once they had finished signing their bricks, they could then play with some pretend bricks and some of the constructions were truly impressive. After a busy afternoon learning a little bit about Fulham Palace and how bricks are made, we found a nice spot on the grass for our picnic.
Little Forest Folk
Fulham