Into the Woods
Today we joined our childminder and the gang at Forest School.
Forest school is an opportunity for the children to play and learn in an outdoor, messy, fun setting. There's a mud kitchen, bug viewers, a den, mud art. They make natural crafts and then have hot chocolate and biscuits around a fire.
While I was there they were planning future visits (they go weekly) and how they would fit them in with their topics. I now know this is going to involve making bird feeder and some food adventures with the fire.
I can hear some of you already "there's a fire, and children?!" yes there is a fire but the children go no where near it, there is a visual barrier of sticks, lots of supervision and most importantly they are taught. How can children ever learn about fire safety if they're never exposed to fire? I agree that it's better they are exposed to and experience risk at an early age so they can learn to handle that risk rather than just developing a fear. This goes beyond fire of course. I know young children have very little concept of consequences and risk in that sense but what they do have is adults, adults who are there to teach, guide and protect them, they listen to these adults and follow their lead exactly as children are designed to.
There's bits of the Forest School which don't appeal to me as much, like the young boy asking his Mum and one of the other assistants to touch his new friend, Harley the slug, I quickly avoided that one! There's a lot of encouragement to experience everything and this is amazing. I might not want to get coated in mud and pick up slugs, worms and other insects but I'm glad my daughter gets to experience this.
I hope we can go again with the childminder because Roo decided she was not going to co-operate and instead was going to cling to me like a limpet! She often does this when I'm there and her childminders are there but I think that's because the usual pattern is I drop her off so she doesn't trust me to stay. She loves her childminders but I think she values some Mummy time too, as do I when she's not driving me insane. We're going to work on that and hopefully next time will be better.
Forest school is an opportunity for the children to play and learn in an outdoor, messy, fun setting. There's a mud kitchen, bug viewers, a den, mud art. They make natural crafts and then have hot chocolate and biscuits around a fire.
While I was there they were planning future visits (they go weekly) and how they would fit them in with their topics. I now know this is going to involve making bird feeder and some food adventures with the fire.
I can hear some of you already "there's a fire, and children?!" yes there is a fire but the children go no where near it, there is a visual barrier of sticks, lots of supervision and most importantly they are taught. How can children ever learn about fire safety if they're never exposed to fire? I agree that it's better they are exposed to and experience risk at an early age so they can learn to handle that risk rather than just developing a fear. This goes beyond fire of course. I know young children have very little concept of consequences and risk in that sense but what they do have is adults, adults who are there to teach, guide and protect them, they listen to these adults and follow their lead exactly as children are designed to.
There's bits of the Forest School which don't appeal to me as much, like the young boy asking his Mum and one of the other assistants to touch his new friend, Harley the slug, I quickly avoided that one! There's a lot of encouragement to experience everything and this is amazing. I might not want to get coated in mud and pick up slugs, worms and other insects but I'm glad my daughter gets to experience this.
I hope we can go again with the childminder because Roo decided she was not going to co-operate and instead was going to cling to me like a limpet! She often does this when I'm there and her childminders are there but I think that's because the usual pattern is I drop her off so she doesn't trust me to stay. She loves her childminders but I think she values some Mummy time too, as do I when she's not driving me insane. We're going to work on that and hopefully next time will be better.
Forest Footsteps is based in Wetherby and can be found on
Online www.forestfootsteps.co.uk/
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