Birch Forest Schools

Today was the first Wilberlee bench making session.

Following on from the school INSET in February Wilberlee identified a desire to have a dedicated outdoor seating space which could be used as a fire circle. As well as acting as a focal point for outdoor activities, it is a wonderful opportunity for the children to get involved in making this happen.

Over the next few weeks, groups will take part in different making tasks. They will learn how to use bow saws, how to split logs, make pegs for joining and even do a little whittling.

In today’s session the most surprising thing for me was just how able the children were to come up with ideas for bench design. While some may have been impractical for around a fire circle, all had merit and some will be incorporated further down the line.

The children from class two and three worked very well together. They communicated effectively and carried out the tasks required to make the log benches.

At the end of the session, some sawn logs, some drilled holes, the beginnings of some handmade pegs, lots of great ideas, laughter and fun.

Even with a whole month passing since our last session the children were able to talk with confidence about the things in the wood we needed to be mindful of to keep ourselves safe. Right from the start the children were mindful of walking around the fire circle and stuck to this for the majority of the session despite there being no fire or hot kettle today.

As there was a lot of new growth in the woods, the Last Session Review was supplanted somewhat by an impromptu forage walk where the children were shown different plants, some of which were edible, others protected and others invasive.

The children were interested and smelled the leaves. Had the forage site not been on a main dog walk, they would have tried some of them.

All of the children had heard the Three Little Pigs story and were familiar with the role of the wolf as “big and bad”. By using the Alternative Three Little Pig story, which tells the tale from the wolfs perspective, it was possible to engage the children in a shelter building narrative with a story both familiar and new.

We then discussed the merits of the pigs houses and their choices of building material.

The story led naturally into shelter building but the children were shown images of shelters which might be made in the woods. We discussed the different features of the shelters then the children set about making their own with tarps, string and sticks.

The children worked alone or in pairs and made use of existing shapes in the trees for the framework. Many included pegs and poles.

The children could choose to have their drink in their shelters, though some wanted to sit at the fire circle. They all took turns to use wipes, get their drinks and a biscuits.

We looked at each shelter in turn and pointed out where it had fulfilled the brief to be waterproof, warm, windproof, comfortable and hidden. All but two of the groups were happy to talk about their shelters. The children not only pointed out their construction methods but spoke about how they might improve their shelters.

Today the children seemed genuinely happy to be in the woods, enjoying being outdoors, walking in the mud and handling sticks etc.

They expressed a high level of knowledge around keeping safe as they have in previous sessions and had lots to talk about throughout the session.

During the shelter building, there was less “I can’t do it” than in other activities. This may well have been because of the free form nature of the activity or out of a sense of confidence that their efforts are valid no matter the outcome.

The groups worked well together with no arguments or negative interaction between the groups. The children were focused and enjoyed the activity.

On reflection, I realise I was not asked by any of the children to tie knots for them! This is quite unusual in a group and a step forward for this group from earlier sessions.

The dynamics today were superb. The children had such a positive attitude to all aspects of the session. It felt as though they were squeezing every last drop of enjoyment out of the afternoon. After the tidying up we discussed that this would probably be the last session in this programme and all of the children expressed regret that that was the case.

There was only one Babes session this week as I was leaving Friday for a canoeing trip in the Wye Valley with an assortment of Bushcraft Geeks from my course.

Our theme for the day was snakes. We started looking at different animals camouflage before trekking into the woods to look for exotic animals, snakes, three blind mice, a rat, two frogs and… a rubber chicken. I can never resist making a “look there’s chicken in the woods!” joke. Which of course no one gets.

Now at this point I was going to recount the tale of how the snake lost his legs.

But I forgot.

I was too excited by the chicken in the woods, I forgot to tell the story. Rather alarmingly no one seemed to notice (I bet C. would have had he been there).

I made hot drinks while everyone else collected things to thread onto string to make their own leaf snakes.

There was quality sliding-down-the-banking action and quite a bit of if-I-splash-this-stick-in-a-puddle-what-will-happen.

M. did his first mud slide today. A long way from sleeping baby in a pushchair.

As you can see from the photos, this was quite a rainy morning. Ideal for shelter building as it gave everyone the chance to see just how waterproof their shelters might be.

We started small. Having looked at pictures of debris shelters and discussed how they are made, everyone set to making use of  spaces in tree roots, stones, sticks and moss for camouflage. J. Put a big stick in the ground to stop anyone from standing on his mini shelter and M. Made his for the hedgehog who was visiting from Marsden Infants School.

As there was not too much debris around, we used tarps for the full size shelters. Families made all sorts of shelters in a variety of shapes and all of them seemed to keep the rain off.

To finish off we split down a log and made tent pegs with sheath knives. Children worked safely under supervision of their parents, Lisa and I.

A wet day, but a lot of fun all round.

Busy weeks are all well and good but catching up with blog postings can be difficult as one rainy day melds into another.

Then I look at the photos from the session and I remember that yes indeed it was a rainy day, at least in part.

That we chose the practice coracle, now a hat for the magic item in the name game then took turns wearing it for no other reason than it was hat shaped.

That I found a wonderful use for L’s uncanny ability to whistle like a bird by incorporating her bird song in the story via judicious use of the elbow nudge.

That it is possible to revel in the sound of a child’s voice while not completely understanding what they are saying to you.

That the muddy banking causes tears as well as laughter.

That the ribbons can be used to make a horse fence.

That the sun doesn’t need to shine for me to enjoy what I do.

Having made sixty ground loom pegs, I was determined to get some use out of them so I carted the whole lot down to the woods for this week’s Babes in the Woods sessions.

But what about a story? Something with weaving spiders? Rumplestiltskin? Sheep…Marsden sheep.

The Marsden Rainbow Ram.

There are strange creatures roaming the moors under the first full moon of Spring.

Were you to picnic to excess and suffer “the post lunch dip” then fall asleep, head upon a mossy rock, you might wake up under that full moon and…

Everyone seemed to get on well with their weaving. The hammering of the pegs and choosing of coloured wool proving to be most popular with the children. As did bouncing on J. and giggling uproariously.

In the midst of such changeable weather, we managed to have a lovely sunny day for our Wild Weaving workshop at Crow Lane School.

The workshop took place over the course of the morning with two classes, years four and three taking part.

Each class was introduced to the idea of weaving on a big scale with natural materials by having a go on the fence loom. As well as colour and texture, children looked at the different lengths of material they were using.

The classes were then split with Lisa leading one activity and me leading another. While one class focused on weaving wool pieces (on a ground loom and with woolly bug needles) the other class wove in three dimensions to produce bird feeders and modal coracles to sail on their pond.

Unfortunately we did not have time to cover the coracles with the waterproofed canvas as I got distracted explaining how coracles could be waterproofed. This meant setting fire to a selection of materials, pine resin, bees wax, bitumen and letting the children smell them in a kind of Palaeolithic glue sniffing session.

The most surprising thing about the morning was just how well the children did with some quite complex activities. Weaving is a very soothing occupation and the children showed remarkable application to the tasks.

To prevent horse incursion through the fire circle I set up “THE HORSE WALL”. This proved to be a great source of interest to the children who couldn’t wait to help me supplement it with sticks gathered from around the site.

As with yesterday’s session my cunning plan of occupying the grownups while children played worked a treat. Apart from repairs to the Horse Wall, general tree climbing and a bit of sliding down the not-so-muddy banking, M. Seemed to have devised a game which involved him falling asleep on the bench then inching his way along it like a slug.

Horses for courses I say.

There were three new families to welcome with one lady coming from Macclesfield to join in!

B. was very helpful with the hot chocolate pouring and the children managed to finish two jugs with not a drop to spare.

I almost forgot, this was out fortieth session since becoming a Community Group.

Marvelous.

The long awaited sun came out for today’s session and as we walked along the river to the fire circle, I remembered why I do this job. I left the tarp off so that we could all soak up some much needed sun shine and for the first time I saw hair on the heads of some attendees, usually hidden away under woolly hats.

As I had been making woolly bug needles for an in school wild weaving session, I thought we could make woolly bugs at Babes in the Wood. I used a “How the ladybird got it’s spots” that I made up and showed the children of ladybird nymphs which look like…woolly bugs!

As the story was a short one, I supplemented it with exciting ladybird trivia first, all the while C. asked “when will we have a story”

“But there are over 5000 types of ladybird”

“when will we have a story”

“And they can have 0 – 20 spots”

“when will we have a story”

“and they can be red, orange, black, yellow and…PINK!”

“when will we have a story”

So we had the story, and then…

“when will we have a story”

Yet again, shot down in flames by a pre-school child.

“Why do I do this job again?”

We were back to “sunny but chilly” for the second session of Babes in the Wood this week. That said no one seemed to notice as we played the bridge drum with sticks and stones and crossed over despite the waiting troll.

Out came the Billy goats once again and one by one they talked their way out of being eaten for the Troll-fol-di-rolls supper until the biggest, fattest and juiciest butted the troll into the river.

As this was a slightly larger group and had some older children, I brought the hand drill which some mum’s gamely used to make holes for goat legs.

After snack time there was a bit of sliding down the rather dry banking and general tree climbing and what Grandma Ronnie refers to as “Mulloxing about” which I believe is a play work term.

O. brought a willow rod that he had found on the floor and bent into what to me looked like a very good magic wand, unprompted and unaided. “No, he said it’s a magic boat” Well whatever it was it was very good.

Some children were daring enough to put fingers in the mouth of the muddy troll who was still clinging to a tree. Though in the spirit of exploring materials they then removed said Troll with extreme prejudice and scattered him to his native earth. Such is the joy of ephemeral art!

There was a rather odd turn to the putting out of ribbons.

Children are asked what colour the ribbons in the tin are before I open the tin. The ribbons are always red. Sometimes children shout out other colours and this is all part of a game with no rules but which is humorous and entertaining (for me at least). It occurred to me that just like Schroedinger’s cat, until the tin was opened the ribbons could be any colour the children chose.

I did try to explain this to the group of under fives. But for the most part they just decided that the ribbons were red after all. I think I managed to rescue this flight of fancy by telling the children that the ribbons were red because most of the children said they were!

Quantum mechanics at Forest School!