This week we have been very busy at Wimbledon! The colder weather has arrived, and we have spent time finding fun and exciting ways to keep warm using the amazing things we have around us!
We have been spending a lot of time looking at how we make hot drinks to keep us warm on these chillier days. The children have been lucky enough to use the Kelly kettle to boil the water and then choose which flavour tea they would like to drink. We have been sitting around the small fire and adding the water to the kettle, waiting for it to make a whistling sound so we knew it was ready. The children got so excited when it whistled and all said, “It’s ready!” We then all chose the flavour that we wanted and got to have a chance to experience some different tastes and smells. It was a lovely experience for the children to try new flavours and learn about new tastes as well as smells.
We have also been talking about all our different senses and noticing different things around the forest. We have been listening to the sounds of the leaves under our feet. Crunching as we walk and then rustling as we threw them up into the air. We also took some time go on a bird spotting adventure around the forest. The children had a list of birds, and we went around trying to spot their colours and listen for their calls. It is such a wonderful time to learn about new sounds and sights of the forest, at the same time as finding out about the creatures that call the forest home.
We have also taken some time to do some sensory activities which included pasta and spaghetti and feeling them when they were cooked versus uncooked and looking into the textures. We also had a chance to add different herbs and spices to mix smells and let our noses experience something new. The children were also able to practice their fine motor skills and scissor work by cutting the spaghetti into pieces. Everyone had so much fun playing with the different textures and smells and taking it in turns to mix everything together.
We think it is so important that the children learn about their senses and use them to then learn more about our forest surroundings. We are so lucky with the amazing sight, sounds and smells in the forest and it’s so lovely for the children to be able to learn about them.
Little Forest Folk
Wimbledon