What a gorgeous week we have had, the sun has shined, and our forest is looking so beautiful!
This has been a week of adventure walks! We have been back to areas we have not been in a while and the children were amazed by how much the forest has grown since they were last in those spots. Our little ones were able to engage in some amazing conversations about seasons and growth. On these walks the children are always able to do lots of climbing and exploring. One group went to the beech tree forest where they ran up and down a big slippery hill! Another group went to visit a fallen tree known as the Piggy train where they imagined they were train drivers travelling to far off lands.
Back on site we have done lots of climbing too. One new activity has been the slack line. Not only is this an activity we can do in the shade, but it is amazing at helping our children build their strength and balancing skills. Our foresters line up patiently, as we can only have 2 children at a time. When it is their go, they climb up on to the line carefully, once they have got their balance, they are able to start walking along. It is amazing watching how quickly the children can identify good ways to climb along and hold their balance. They show so much resilience, when they fall off they seem even more determined to get to the end. One child was walking along the slack line and said, “Look, I’m good at this”! How wonderful the children are able to notice their strengths and talk about themselves so positively.
With the beautiful weather we have been having, we have been so lucky to see so much growth in our forest. Our meadow is covered in all sorts of different flowers which has meant the Bumblebees have come out to collect the pollen. Our kids have loved watching them at work and discussing what they are doing. It amazing to hear the children talking about pollination and the life cycle of bees.
In Fox group, all the ladybirds we have seen this week inspired our painting activity. On our walk into the forest, we collected some stones trying to find ones that were shaped like ladybirds. Our young ones were then able to paint them red, and later when dried, added black spots. The Bunnies have also been very artistic this week creating their own superhero capes. After decorating their capes, the children were able to run around engaging in imaginative play, with each superhero having different powers.
With the heat we have had at the start of this week, there has been lots of water play in the forest. Not only does this help cool us down but it provides endless play opportunities. The children use the water to add to their cooking pot, to mix with dirt to make mud or tip down the hill to make ‘rivers’. We had a scale with a bucket hanging in our trees and some children worked hard to transfer water from one side of our play area all the way to the bucket using cups. They were fascinated by watching the numbers on the scales moving up as the bucket became heavier. Once filled with water they began experimenting by adding other items from small stones to large pipes.
The activities that we have in the forest encourage so many different skills in our children. We teach them to be independent by giving them the opportunity to do things for themselves, challenging themselves each day. We help them to gain confidence in their abilities by showing them to not give up if they don’t get something right straight away, but to keep on trying. These are all things that they will carry though life and it’s wonderful that they can learn these skills in such an amazing environment!
It has been another week and have a fantastic weekend!
Little Forest Folk
Wimbledon