Forest School Week 4

Forest School Week 4 

All Day and Afternoon Nursery

This week was all about birds, how to identify them and what they might eat. The children had some great ideas and felt comfortable sharing them. One of the things we discussed was that birds need to have a sharp eye to find their food. As the weather gets colder, the ground becomes harder making it difficult to find worms and the berries become more scarce. 

In order to understand how tricky it can be to find food, we played our bird food game which involved the children looking for wool 'wiggly worms'. When they found a worm, they brought it back to the 'nest' and matched it to the red, green or brown pile depending on the colour they'd found. At the end of the game we gathered around the 'nest' and noticed which colour was found the most and which colour was found the least. We found lots of red ones, some green but only one or two brown ones. The children thought about why this might be and we talked about how the brown ones in particular camouflage into their surroundings. 

During the session some children gathered on the 'bird world' tarp to read some special bird books and listen to the calls of the different birds. Others enjoyed looking after our soft toy birds, listening to their calls and making them nests. 

Others preferred to make repeating pattern bird feeders by threading apple, cheese and raisins onto a stick as a birdie kebab. We needed to be careful as we pushed the food on to make sure we didn't poke ourselves with the stick. Once they were finished we balanced them in the trees for the birds. It was quite tricky to find the perfect spot among the branches where our stick would balance the best but the children persevered and kept experimenting in different places.

The mallets were of great interest today too with children making stick houses for the birds flying overhead and the forest friends. We supported the children to use the tools safely and encouraged them to find strong small sticks to use. We also had our usual diggers who had lots of fun making delicious concoctions. 

Maths with a five frame

Using a five frame

We have been playing games to help us learn about the number 5.  We used a five frame which is just an outline with 5 spaces or boxes in a row.  Inside we had this drawn out on large paper and outside we used chalk to make one on the playground.  

This is a five frame: 

We learnt that a five frame has 5 spaces, and one item can go in each space.  When all the spaces are full there are 5 objects.  We can say this without counting the objects again.  

We enjoyed showing 5 with our fingers and saying 'High Five' to our friends.

The children in the pictures are taking turns to roll a 1 and 2 dot dice, before putting the matching number of items to the five frame.  We worked in teams and took turns.  The winning team was the team which placed the last item to fill the five frame.  

Adults asked questions to help the children think like "How many spaces are full?  How many spaces are empty?  What number will we need next to win the game.  

We noticed things like two red hoops and three green hoops make 5.

Why not draw out a five frame at home and have fun finding objects to fill it up?

 

Forest School Week 3

Forest School 17th November

All day and Afternoon Nursery 

The group gathered together to start the session with our usual routine sharing our song, names and counting everyone. The children are growing in confidence and independence each week.

After this we focused on a teamwork task.  We worked together to gather cherry leaves, yellow maple leaves and brown maple leaves to create a mandala on the open grass space. As we added items to the pattern, we needed to make sure that we were communicating with our peers to place the items in an agreed position and giving each other enough space as we worked. It was very effective.  The bright colours in the centre leading out to the yellows and browns reminded us of the changing colours of Autumn. 

For the rest of the session, some children enjoyed making diva lamps out of clay, which they decorated with natural materials and added a tea light candle. We had to use our fingers and thumbs to pinch out the clay and shape it, creating enough space for the tea light candle. We used sticks and paint to add some repeating patterns. While we made our diva lamps, Debs told the story of Sita and Rama. 

Others were keen to explore the dens with our little coloured finger torches. They laughed with glee as the different coloured lights danced inside the den, observing how the colours disappear in the light and reappear in the dark. They used their problem-solving skills to work out how to switch them on and off while fostering their turn taking and communication skills. 

We also had our keen diggers and explorers searching for treasure alongside those children engaging in imaginative play with the Forest Friends. 

We ended the session with the question 'what did you enjoy today?' The children listened to each other's contributions remembering we have one voice when we are sitting in the log circle.

 

Forest School Week 2

All Day and Afternoon Nursery Forest School session

The children chose their space to sit and joined in our welcome song. We counted together the number of people at forest school and had a recap of our rules. The children are settling into the routine so nicely. 

As with the reception classes, the session was focused on fire and light. We talked about how we can stay safe around fire and what would happen if we got too close before sharing ideas about the good things fire gives us such as warmth, light and cooking our food. Next we thought about animals that live in our woods and forests, choosing three of them to play our Forest Fire game. The 'animals' had so much fun running away from Debs and Alicia who were the 'fire' and trying to make it back to their forest homes safely.

For the rest of the session the children enjoyed the sensory experience of using the paint to create a fire picture and used elder sticks to make their own firework rockets.

 Others explored the digging area searching for treasure, went on adventures with the Forest Friends and had fun rolling and climbing on the hill.

We ended the session thinking about what we enjoyed and sharing our goodbye song. 

 

Outside Learning

 Outside Learning

Children have enjoyed a wide variety of learning outside so far this term.

We have enjoyed dressing up as different characters!

Digging, pouring and scooping sand is fun and develops maths concepts such as full, empty and half full!

Using chalks helps develop our drawing and writing skills...

Pushing, pulling, climbing and balancing develop our muscles and physical skills.