This week’s activity

Visit to the woods

We are lucky enough to have access to the woodland area, as well as the rest of the school grounds. Being able to explore the natural world around them helps the children develop a sense of place, time and understanding how things happen, when and why.  Hands-on, real life experiences help embed their understanding and make abstract concepts, such as changing seasons and the effects these have on plants and trees meaningful.  Using the items they collect in a range of ways using different media to represent those experiences extends the creative process and enhances their understanding.  Extending their vocabulary through naming and describing develops their listening and speaking skills.  This then links to their literary skills, as they explore the way words are formed and how they represented by marks they see in their environment.

Below are examples of a visit to the woodland area this week, what they discovered and how they used their finds in their play.

On the walk up to the woodland area, the children have to keep safe by following some simple rules.  To help the children walk sensibly, they sang the song “We’re following the leader”.  Once they had arrived at the zebra crossing, they thought about a safe way to cross the road and sang the “green cross code” song, looking and listening before they crossed the road.

Once in the woodlands, the children had to navigate their way safely around.  They needed to climb over a wooden structure using their gross motor skills.  This took a little practice for some of the children but they soon gained in confidence and managed the obstacle.

They then began searching for sticks to bring back to the Pre-school to use in their play.  They found sticks of different sizes, some long, some short, some thin and some wide.  This introduced some mathematical language into their conversations.  One of the older children also helped a younger child to find some sticks.  Lovely.

There were chats about the weather and how lovely it was to feel the warm sunshine.  One child noticed the snowdrops and said how much they liked them.

On their return to the Pre-school, the children thought about what they could do with their sticks.  One child suggested “we could build a bonfire”.  This then led to a group of children working collaboratively to build a ‘bonfire’ in the garden.

There are photos on our Facebook page

Thank you.

The Pre-school Team