Sometimes it is the simplest things that brings joy to our lives. Watching a young child discover the properties of falling water fills me with joy. The wonder and inquiry that is involved is like no other. Somewhere along the way adults lose that wonder, until a child comes along and forces us to see the world through a fresh set of eyes.
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Today, we introduced the students to a new chapter of Forest Fours by implementing a writing component to our day. Each child received a special journal that travels with us while on the trails. The students are allowed to draw pictures of the games that they are playing, the structures they build, or the specimens they see while out in nature (fungus, birds, rocks, deer, etc.). They also are allowed to collect things like leaves or small pieces of moss and tape them into their journals for safe keeping.
In addition to the journals, we borrowed four Polaroid cameras from Mrs. Weber so that the students can take pictures of items that would be too big to fit in their journals. The pictures are then taped onto a page and the students write about what they observed. The journals will travel with us each time we venture into the woods and the children are allowed to fill their journals to their heart’s content whenever they deem it necessary.
Since it’s inception, our class has used Forest Four days to play in an unstructured setting so that they could explore and create at their will. The addition of the forest journals allows students to extend their learning by giving them the opportunity to write, even while outdoors. Through this activity, the students are practicing skills such as fine motor development, phonemic awareness, self-regulation, observation, categorization, identification, and much more. We look forward to sharing our journal entries with you in the future!
Now that the weather is starting to become colder, snow and ice have made it’s way to our playground! The list below are things that will help our children stay warm and cozy on these blustery days!
This week, we had the opportunity to introduce the Fairy Tale Trail to the Pre-K students. It is one of our smaller trails, but has been beautifully embellished with a variety of whimsical decorations from the older students. Today, we were able to spend an extended period of time exploring the ins and outs of the Fairy Tale Trail on our Forest Fours day. It didn’t take long before the children made an exciting discovery! Someone had taken three of my painted “Story Stone” houses (that were meant for the small world table) and placed them on the Fairy Tale Trail! They naturally thought that I had placed them there but after learning that I had nothing to do with it, they had decided that fairies must have used their magic to put them on the trail and turn them into fairy houses. Fairy magic is some pretty amazing stuff!
Now, they are commissioning me to make more fairy houses that can live on the trail. After all, winter is coming and every fairy needs a place to live. So don’t be surprised if you show up to school only to find me stealing rocks from the playground or covered in paint in the classroom. It’s messy job but someone’s gotta do it!
This week, the students became interested in a plank of wood that had been used as a part of the circuit on the nature playground. Our students decided to repurpose it and make a bridge on the large rocks. We spent many sessions working out how it could be used safely and problem-solving how to make it more stable for the students to walk on. Today, when the students ran outside to play with the “bridge” they realized that it had been moved to the ground by some of the older students. They immediately started trying to move it, but it appeared to be too heavy/large for just two students to move by themselves, so they began to enlist the other students from different sections of the playground to help.
When more people showed up to help, they positioned themselves around the plank of wood, lifted it up, and started swiftly moving around the rocks. Once they got near the rock that they wanted the bridge, they had to figure out how to maneuver the plank without squashing anyone who happened to be on the other side. With some trail and error, a decent amount of determination, and a little bit of communication they had solved their problem! Not only did they get the bridge back into place, but they were able to stabilize their bridge so that students could safely walk across.
There is nothing better than enjoying snack outside on a beautiful fall morning!
Yesterday, we joined together with the city campus Pre-K class for our annual Nature Day. Our nature explorers spent the whole morning playing, exploring, collecting, climbing, and making new friends. We even got to climb on a large tree that had been cut down on our property. The students couldn’t believe how big it was and were so excited when they figured out how to safely climb on top of it. We also spent some time introducing the new nature playground climbing structure to our new friends. We ended our picturesque day with a singalong and a picnic lunch. We are so excited that the students had some unstructured time to get to know one another and we cannot wait to everyone together again!
Some days we are delighted to find that the students latch onto an idea or hypothesis and just run with it. Today, we were lucky enough to have one of our parents volunteer to read a story called Just A Little Bit by Ann Tompert that involved an elephant and a see saw. The whole book, the elephant tries to play on the see saw, but it just won’t work. He’s too big. Many animals try to come to the rescue by piling on the other side of the see saw but nothing happens. Nothing seems to work until a beetle lands on the animal group and the elephant finally gets to pop up in the air on the other side.
We talked about how this book teaches us about science and that we’re all really scientists. We do science experiments every day without even realizing. When you tell a silly joke and your friend doesn’t laugh, that’s an experiment. When you try a new food that you’re sure is going be disgusting and it’s actually delicious, that’s an experiment. When you launch yourself off the couch and land on your brother, that’s an experiment. (Let’s be honest, some experiments are safer than others.) Sometimes the experiment works and sometimes it doesn’t. What is most important is to ask “why?”. Why didn’t it work? What went wrong? How can you fix it?
Once the story was over, the students jumped at the chance to build their own see saws with our outdoor blocks. Many of the students started on a smaller scale with just one block as the base, while other’s were determined to make their see saws higher. After lots of tinkering and testing, it was decided that the higher see saws were not quite as safe and so we down-graded the amount of blocks that were being used. Some children added the colorful blocks to act as handles, while others used them as a weight so that they could try to see saw by themselves. Even Mrs. Forst joined in on the see saw fun!
There’s nothing better than a recess full of problem solving and physics.
Sometimes we just can’t finish a plan without some assistance. The children have lofty goals when we are exploring the Northbound Trail. Quickly, they realize that their plan requires more hands than they have available.
Asking for help takes both language and cognitive skills. The children must interpret the sensory input they are receiving and accurately weigh the possible outcomes they are faced with while working alone. A tipping point is reached when they decide that another body would be helpful.
The next big obstacle is verbalizing their need to a nearby peer or adult. Knowing “how” to ask for help may seem like a no brainer, but it’s harder than we expect . There is more than one way to ask for help. Some ways will get you the assistance you desire and others will not. For instance, would you agree to help someone who is yelling at you? What if they were talking to you in an exceptionally quiet voice while looking at the ground? One of the most common ways for young children to ask for help is to stand near an adult or peer and stare at them. For reasons I’m sure you can appreciate, that doesn’t always work out.
Guiding children as they develop the skills they need to ask for and receive help is an exciting part of Pre-Kindergarten. Luckily, we’ve got plenty of opportunities for large scale projects and risk-stretching experiences on our Northbound Trail.
In the pictures below, you will see a few examples of Helping Each Other. One child decided that he wanted to place a very large stick so that the tip went through a “Y” in a nearby tree. The mark just happened to be located about 10 feet above the forest floor. Asking a teacher for help got the job done. Mrs. Pless helped carry the stick and aimed while our 4-year-old placed the point in it’s designated spot. This child’s idea inspired a few others to try this plan, as well.
Another child found a detached, curved vine and was determined to make it into a tunnel. However, it was impossible to hold the vine up while experimenting with arrangements to stablize the log. After a few tries, this child enlisted a number of friends to steady the vine. Eventually, she found that using large rocks, she could prop the ends in a manner that would make the tunnel usable.
Near the end of our Green Day, or Forest Four, the children discovered one last tree to climb. Many of the children became anxious about coming down once they perched along the first junction. The branching point that they enjoyed standing on wasn’t very high, but it appeared to be a big drop once you were standing there. Asking friends for help and receiving assistance became very important to the children. Happiliy, many friends rose to the challenge.