Our Week in the Forest...
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, and it really is in the most delightful way. The mild wet weather has made way for frosty mornings, but the sunshine has been so warming in tone that we have barely noticed the cold. We have started to get a little festive here at Wandsworth and we have started to make Christmas decorations and cards using forest materials.
On the amazing adventure walks this week the children have been challenged to find materials that they think would be perfect to decorate a Christmas tree. Scouting on the forest floor they collected pine cones, empty beech nut shells as well as sticks with pretty leaves. On returning to camp they were assisted to tie knots of ribbon onto the ornaments, before cutting card to make labels. The children wanted to add their names to the labels so we provided letter stamps to mark their cards. Sounding out their names the children were able to select each letter, press the block into an ink pad and stamp their names onto the labels. At the end of the day they have been able to hang their very own ornaments onto the Christmas tree at the London Scottish Golf Club on the common. Hopefully by next Thursday the tree will be full of our wonderful children’s decorations.
At Paradise, the children also wanted to make decorations but wanted to make tree cookies instead of using forest treasure. Using the bow saw the children demonstrated brilliant technique, patience and support for their peers. After we were all seated with our tool work and tree cookies, we set our minds to using the paint to draw themed images onto them. Some decided to paint trees others painted presents and one decided to attach three cookies together to create a snowman! Some of the children thought hanging their creations on a tree was a little boring so decided to create a huge ramp to race their cookies against each other!
To keep warm this week not only have we been exploring on our morning adventures we have also ventured out in smaller groups in the afternoon. They have been absolutely beautiful, with a crisp orange light flooding the forest. The children noticed a flash of green in the bare branches; “It’s a bird” they called, “A parakeet!’ cried one, “It’s gone in that hole” they discussed. We spent the next hour spotting parakeet nest holes around the lake. We have noticed that in the smaller groups, the children are able to be much more observant about the environment around them and they communicate even more constructively as a group.
What a lovely week and we look forward to seeing what next week brings us. Have a lovely weekend!
Little Forest Folk
Wandsworth