Our Week in the Forest...
Happy New Year friends and families! We hope you had a wonderful break with your children. We all had a fantastic holiday and are raring to go now it’s 2018! It’s going to be a year of great exploration, excitement and development.
The start of 2018 has already been interesting with storm Eleanor bringing winds of over 40 mph to Wandsworth. As a result, we judged that it was not safe enough to enter the forest with the children and spent an amazingly fun day at our indoor site at the bowling club. Some of the children were still in the Christmas spirit when they arrived and started wrapping presents for each other. Using newspaper, string and tape they wrapped the fruit before giving it out as little parcels at snack time! Clementine’s wrapped in paper really are a joy!
We may have been inside but we still love getting messy and during the morning we made playdough as a group, following a simple recipe.
Throughout the process we tested the texture. “It’s sloppy,” remarked one of the children, so we added more flour and salt. “The salt has made it sticky,” remarked another. We tinkered with our creation until it was just right. Creating pancakes and other yummy foods to eat, we squashed, rolled, squeezed and poked our playdough with sticks to form new shapes. In the afternoon we studied the effects of the strong wind on different materials we had. Blankets billowed in the gusts of wind and the balloons we attached to sticky tape were a perfect makeshift colourful kite. Soon we realised that if we ran into the wind then the balloons would fly higher!
We were lucky enough to go on our second outing this week, this time to the Natural History Museum! Needless to say, it was an awe-inspiring visit. Our road trip in the mini-bus was an adventure in itself for the children. We saw many different animals and the children showed no fear in confronting the moving T-Rex (or was it Simon in disguise we wondered?) and were amazed at how big a Humpback Whale is.
We took a break in the gallery and took time to draw an animal that we had seen on the way. A swathe of dinosaurs, polar bears and a friendly turtle were created by our budding artists. It was fantastic to see how well behaved and interested our Little Forest Folkers can be! They handled the busy environment brilliantly, sticking together and holding hands, showing the big school children how it’s done! We had an amazing day exploring but we cannot wait to get back into the Forest next week!
Hope you all have a very lovely weekend.
Little Forest Folk
Wandsworth