This week the Bowling field mornings have energetically begun with some bold and brilliant constructions using lots of loose parts. With logs, planks, sticks, tyres, pipe cladding, and nets, children of all ages have been highly involved in making obstacle courses, pirate ships, houses and homes, garages, and shops! It’s been great to see that our older children have really developed their sense of risk and ability to judge the way large and heavy parts need to be adjusted and positioned correctly so “bridges” can be successfully traversed or “roofs” stay stable. We have also loved seeing our older children support our newest Little Forest Folk-ers, who are beginning to make their own judgements about safety.
Great imaginations have also turned the tyres into individual sailing boats, and we loved seeing a flotilla of children casually and happily drifting across the seas letting us know across the bow, that they will be in Cornwall in ten hours’ time! Boats continued as children saw a snail had unusually gone for a swim in a water filled Tuff Tray table, so one child decided to save the day by saving the snail and placing it on some wood to float away safely to the side! We absolutely love it that children here grow to have such a great sense of care for the creatures we share our space with.
Creatures continued over afternoons at the Bowling Club as lots of new children have now been introduced to our pet worms in our wormery. Having had this system established for over a year now, there’s hundreds upon hundreds of them to investigate and nurture. Older children continue to develop grip and cutting skills, slicing up fruit and veg scraps, whilst younger ones have currently enjoyed tearing paper and card to pieces to add to the mix. This activity continues to be a highly tangible way of introducing children to recycling in action, as the worms munch the food, lay eggs that produce more worms, that ends up in a lower tray as a usable liquid fertiliser that completes a cycle of caring for our environment.
Wiggly worms made of string also made an appearance in the forest this week, with Dan’s creation of weaving and threading boards suspended between trees. Here the laughter and smiles has been contagious, as children joyously celebrate the successes of poking and pulling fiddly strings through several dozen holes. This is exactly the sort of activity that is going to help all those fine motor muscles begin to get to grips with all the important moments of getting things done by themselves, be that prodding rolling peas onto forks, putting on flippy floppy socks, or peeling tricky stickers off sheets!
We’ve wound down the end of this week with bubble popping parties in the glorious afternoon sun, and we hope your weekends are similarly as fun! We’re looking forward to hearing all about it soon.
Little Forest Folk
Wandsworth