Forest School Highlights in EYFS!

Lesson: Learning Outside the Classroom

Class: Foundation Year: 2023 - 2024

Forest School at Sherwood invites the children to be expressive, to challenge their senses, to take risks, to be daring and to make happy mistakes.  The children's physical development and their breadth of vocabulary has also grown considerably.  Each week, the children have explored the wider grounds as part of their learning about the world and nature.  They have investigated states of matter with melting and freezing when it was icy.  They have made a range of birdfeeders using pinecones, apples and cardboard tubes.  They have been nature detectives, looking for signs of Winter, then observing how the grounds change and start to show initial signs of life.  We have been adventurous, walking over natural obstacles and uneven ground to reach the far corners of the grounds.  This included using thre bird hides to look at signs of life and turning over decaying logs and rocks to look for life in the soil.  Discovering different shades of natural colours in the environment and feeling textures in nature have also been a large focus of our Forest School.  We created clay tiles imprinted with environmental patterns and built this up by foraging for resources.  The children enjoyed collecting their own mud paint, and using their fingers to feel the shapes they made and develop vocabulary for their senses.