Our Forest School

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Forest School enables children to experience the outdoor world.  It helps them learn to take and manage risks in a safe environment, whilst exploring and discovering their natural surroundings.

Here at Little Villagers, we are lucky enough to have a employed a Forest School leader with a wealth of experience in outdoor learning and Forest School activities.  With his knowledge, supported by our own team and the use of the enclosed secure woodlands and the wonderful grounds within Woodcote House School, the children are free to develop their learning and experience the joy of the outdoors.  Many of the photographed activities will be posted in the parent portal section (under Forest School)  on our website and also on our Facebook page for parents to see.

Since we have started our Forest School sessions the children are all thoroughly enjoying their learning. They are very proud to put on their Forest School overalls and head off to explore. Thank you to Mr and Mrs Manning for organising our very smart overalls.
So far the children have been building pretend campfires, looking for Dinosaur Eggs, climbing the tree’s, they have even spotted a dragon who has been asleep for a 1000 years. Take a look through our photos. Can you spot the dragon ?

Our Forest School at Little Villagers

Please scroll down for all photographs

We wanted to tell about some of the learning opportunities our children are experiencing at our wonderful forest school.

The site is situated in the beautiful private secure grounds and woodlands of Woodcote House School.  The children enjoy the short stroll from our building across the playing fields to the woods where an area is set aside this we call our base camp.  They assemble on the log seats where our Forest School Leader Mr Smith chats to the children about their day and activities they might like to participate in.  During this time he has the opportunity to talk to them about risk taking safely, enjoying the environment around them, seeing and hearing nature first hand and exploring the exciting world we live in.

The children are free and encouraged to use their imagination to create play ideas – children’s ideas evolve through their play, for example  stick play, always playing safely, this has led to stick brushing, stick mark making, clearing areas using sticks to enable them to build camps,  to dragging branches across clearings to build themselves seesaws.  The children are learning to climb trees safely with adult supervision, learning their boundaries and capabilities.  The learning opportunities are endless within this environment, physical development is key, strengthening the children physically as they play, climb and explore.

Others areas of play introduced by Mr Smith include erecting a low zip wire for the children to experience the thrill of speed and movement, building their own tee pee, raising hammocks for them to relax in and observe the sky above them, as well as learning the skill of skipping using lengths of rope.

After our Forest School sessions the children extend their learning within the classroom for example by mark making around leaves, size ordering and weighing conkers to making Lego dens for small world animals.

In all, we are delighted with Forest School and would like to thank Mr Smith for the energy and enthusiasm he brings to the experience. 

For us it is another fabulous addition to our quality Pre-School and we, as staff, are thrilled to be able to offer this to your children as an additional learning experience.

To see photographs of some of the activities taking place at Forest School please go to the Parent Portal – Forest School. You also see some of the activities on our Facebook page.  Please do check both on a regular basis.