With the leaves falling down around us our children at Wimbledon have been enjoying all the joys that autumn brings. We have been looking at the different colours that are arriving around us; the golds, reds and oranges. This has then prompted the children to ask many questions about the changes happening, as well as create so many opportunities for exploring!
There has been a shift in the forest this week with some crisp mornings and sunshine displaying the first real signs of autumn. This has boosted our conversations about autumn and what that means for our forest. The children have noticed more leaves blanketing the ground and mushrooms popping up around us. Whilst encouraging the children to look up, the children have been noticing the difference between the types of trees around us and discussing the changing colours of the leaves.
Fallen leaves have been incorporated into our activities by writing numbers on them and allowing the children to put them in order and doing some number matching. Letter cookies were hidden amongst leaves to create a letter hunt.
We discovered some purple mushrooms near base camp this week and this lead to a mushroom hunt on an adventure walk, where the children kept their eyes peeled for all sorts of fungi in the forest. The children loved seeing all the kinds of shapes and sizes the mushrooms can appear in whilst still keeping in mind our ‘no picking, no licking’ rule.
We have also spent some time talking about our teeth this week. When the new dentist kit arrived in the forest our children were beyond excited to see what was inside. They looked at the different equipment that the dentists use, the things they have to wear and then learnt about everything that comes with being a dentist. We spoke about the importance of keeping our teeth healthy, talking through the different things that we do every day to look after our teeth. Our children loved telling their friends about their own tooth brushing at home and what they used. This kit then led to some role play and the children taking on the roles of patient and dentist. They took on all the knowledge that they had learnt from the earlier discussions and shared this in their game. It’s such a great way for the children to learn new information and skills.
There is always something new that our children learn, and really WANT to learn. They are fascinated by new information and facts that they can share and incorporate into their play. They love taking on new roles in their play which have come from the new information that they have learnt, and it’s a great opportunity for them to spend some time with their friends sharing the new information.
Every day is a day to learn, and the forest is just the perfect place for that to happen!
Little Forest Folk
Wimbledon