Welcome to our “Campfire Notes”, a collection of reflections of our program and Outdoor Education in general. Click on the posts below for more details!
At FSFNS we have 3 simple guiding commitments that help forge our program: connection with self, connection with others and connection with nature. We find things go smoothly when we are connected to all these things. And under the umbrella of nature connection (and likely self and others, too) we’d like to take a deep dive into the importance of connection to place. We call this (appropriately enough) place-based education- and it’s not just a current educational buzzword, but an integral part of FSFNS.
In a nutshell, our program is rooted in what is local – our community, our unique history, geography and culture. This occurs weekly simply by attending Forest School and creating that connection with the properties we use and visit. It also occurs on a smaller level, anytime and anywhere that helps personalize learning for our students. This could be our sit spots, group forts, special areas of the forest we explore… you get the picture. It happens in the form of repetitive visits to the same spaces, and develops deep connection with direct experiential contact. We’ve got “repetitive” in bold because we find this arguably the most important thing in understanding and connection to space.
This got us reflecting over the past week or so and we wanted to help illustrate the spectrum of activities, connections and stories that make up one small (well sort of significant) area of Bygone Day’s: The Big Pond. It started as fun, but then we took this on as a challenge to see how much we could come up with from the past few years (you’ll notice a few may be a stretch!)…. and here we go:
Ice-Fishing, Shore Fishing and Canoe Fishing (Rock Bass and Perch!)
Skating
Canoeing and Stand Up Paddle Boarding
Frog and Turtle Hunting
Swimming
Birding (Herons, Ducks, Geese, so many songbirds… really just so much!)
The swallows that hunt the insects above the water
Building epic dams, bug hotels and other constructions
Sit Spot and quiet time reflection
The home of a Muskrat we watched for weeks
Pond Studies
Homemade Rafts
A shortcut in the winter to other places
Ice safety and measuring ice/water levels
The infamous “toe-biter” and so many other insects/larvae
Lakeside Fires
Water for our Gardens
Water for our Clay Factory
Water for “nature and mud soups” for the teachers
So many snails
Imaginative Markets
Countless hours of just observing
Tracking in the Winter (and Summer!)
Sorting out big feelings and emotional regulation
Mud dances and soaked boots
Reflecting on other times at the pond (“Remember that time…”) full of awe
Wild edibles and cooking
Tree ID, Plant ID, Wildlife ID, all sorts of ID
The list goes on and on! And oh, if this place could talk, the stories it would tell…
…but the kids seem to have that covered for us anyway!
“You smell like campfire” is something we often hear after a day at FNS. And more often than not, it seems to be said in longing, nostalgic way. Usually it’s followed by “I love that smell” and when we are really lucky, complete strangers will dive into fond memories of childhood or a specific moment – maybe a camping trip in Algonquin, a moonlit Yukon night, or some other magical place in time.
(Take a minute to think back to a particularly important campfire you once had… what are your feelings associated with this?)
Of course, we love the smell of campfire, too – it’s part of the job description. We have many fond memories over the past 4 years (already!) at FNS, and really want to take a minute to unpack just how important fires are to our program. They are so much more than just a way to keep warm (though that’s important, too!) or a hard skill to be taught.
Our students learn quickly how to build fires. They use magnesium and steel, which can be tricky but when they are successful, a spark ignites (womp, womp) in them… their confidence grows and they feel empowered. It creates real responsibility as they become keepers of the fire.
Further, fire is about coming together. It’s where we start and debrief our days, get creative and appreciate our friends. It’s where teamwork shines, through making the fire itself, playing games, and cooking meals. It’s how our community gets stronger, as we tell stories, sing songs, reflect and take breaks to just be together. It’s a safe space to talk about what’s on our minds. It’s also part of our human evolutionary history, what we call recapitulative play.
Every campfire we have is important. Just as the smokes lingers with us long after the fire has been extinguished, so too does the campfire and all of its significance leave imprints on us.
Metcalfe Rock is, and has been, an important place to Free Spirit for many years. For those of you who have never been, it’s totally worth the trip! Metcalfe is part of the Kolopore Uplands with trails that run in and among the Niagara Escarpment. In our humble opinion, it’s a magical place and it’s become a sort of ritual to return to the caves with our students each year.
Risky play is a huge part of what we do at FNS. It takes many different shapes, but always involves pushing limits and comfort zones in a thrilling and exciting way. It’s about testing oneself – and finding out what happens. During risky play, children not only experience an element of danger – actual or perceived – but they also risk receiving the potential benefits. With this in mind, it’s not a free-for-all in the caves, but a calculated adventure supported by the educators.
So why do we do it? Well, first of all it’s fun! Metcalfe is a surreal place full of magnificent crevice caves. It’s a step back in geological history where we literally go inside rock that is 450 million years, that was then carved and shaped by the last ice age. It’s also a place with rich cultural history and ancient trees and it’s a recreational haven you could explore for a lifetime. Not to mention you can also drink from natural springs! All of this and more, right in our own “backyard” (yay for place-based connections!).
Now why do we really do it? Aside from some obvious science, history and geography lessons we teach and the nature-connections we make, it’s also about personal growth for us. While caving, we push ourselves to expand our comfort zones. We find our limits and respect them, but sometimes push them, too. Not only are we developing physical literacy, we are building self-esteem, confidence and our socio-emotional self…all while caving!
As with everything we do, caving is challenge-by-choice for our students, and heavily front-loaded. Taking risks is integral to whole-child development, well-being and health. Exploring the caves is a great way to target this while teaching how to independently manage risks and be safe. We see trust developing, teamwork, encouragement and support. We see a shift a group dynamics, new friends, and leadership… we tend to see a different group leave then that which arrived. And this is why it is so important to us.
At Free Spirit Forest Nature School we have the opportunity to spend time with your children as they explore the natural world around them each day. It’s truly amazing to see where and how they take new opportunities. In fact, play is arguably the most important part of our Forest and Nature School and the current social trend is recognizing its importance in whole child-development. In his book, Children and Nature Design Principles for Educators (2008), David Sobel identified 7 play motifs for children:
Going on adventures
Fantasies and imagination
Shaping small worlds
Developing friendships with animals
Maps and Paths (discovering local geography)
Creating special places (forts, tree houses, etc)
Playing hunting and gathering games
He argues that by simply observing children at play in a woodsy, forested area you will see some form of all these motifs unfold. In our own practice and experience at FNS, we see this everyday and believe that it’s universal among children.
Understanding our role as educators, we know our job at FSFNS is to follow the children’s lead and extend their ideas when possible. We know that play is valuable in and of itself, but it’s also a marvelous vehicle for learning! Play theorist Bob Hughes (2002) said, “Play is a biological necessity that puts the child in the driving seat.” And we couldn’t agree more. He created a taxonomy for play and identified around 15 different types (Hughes, 2002). Below are some real examples from our school:
And now for an anecdote!
One day during our unstructured time, students had the opportunity to engage with whatever they were called to – some were drawn to symbolic play through loose parts; some wanted to do cartwheels for miles and swing in trees (locomotor play); while others were taken to whittling and other types of deep or risky play.
A few students were drawn to the idea of recapitulative play – diving into survival mode by creating things from nearby wild edibles (like tea) just like “they did in the olden days”. They foraged and harvested plants independently using previous FNS knowledge and began to set up a School Store, a brilliant form of socio-dramatic play!
Realizing the need more inventory, the students came to us asking, “What else can we sell?” Instead of “adultifying” or interfering with their play by giving them our own ideas, we opted to equip them with a Herbal Book of Natural Recipes to help keep them driven by their own interests! So, book in hand, they took to the forest! Students came back with all sorts of properly foraged treasures and were ready to make some extensions to their products! Our personal favourites – miniature medicine bags wrapped in Lamb’s Ear, a wider variety of herbal teas, and even a diluted sage concoction to make a “local organic mouthwash!”
Attention grew and soon more students became involved in the play, earning themselves various roles (merchants, gatherers, shareholders, patrons and more). “I’d like to by something,” someone asked. “Oh! How can people pay us?” And almost immediately, they established an organized symbolic play system for payment – wood chips, old snail shells, small rocks, and even blades of grass! The next thing we knew, students were selling, trading, sharing, and bartering all sorts of natural treasures!
The busy market lasted for a long while, as students began to share their recipes and secrets to making these innovative creations. And while we adults were engaged in the play as customers, we were able to take a back seat in the child-led play and be a part of their experience. And since that day, the market has been revisited on several occasions.
Play Everyday!
And now for a couple sources:
Hughes, B., 2002. A Playworker’s Taxonomy of Play Types, 2nd edition. London: PlayLink.
Sobel, David, 2008. Children and Nature: Design Principles for Educators. Stenhouse Publishers.
“Teaching a child not to step on a caterpillar is as valuable to the child as it is to the caterpillar” – Bradley Miller
A lot of our focus here at FNS is on environmental education and awareness where we strive to create not only a respect for nature, but a love and sense of belonging in nature for our students. Accordingly a lot of what we do takes place in wild, natural spaces and we certainly do have an impact on our surroundings.
So how do we mitigate this?
It’s a balance (and an imperfect one at that) where we try and determine an acceptable level of impact.
Our first step – education. We follow the the 7 Leave No Trace Principles*:
Plan Ahead and Prepare
We think of this as “Know Before You Go!” and encourage students to be prepared for anything! This can help us address any safety concerns, help us achieve the other LNT principles, and allows for a more enjoyable time. It empowers students to take control and builds self-confidence, leadership and teamwork skills.
Travel and Camp on Durable Surfaces
Though we don’t overnight camp (yet!), we often will set up camp sites for the day, tear them down and return things to the way they were. We have previously established areas that we use to minimized impact, and rotate through these campsites to give the areas a “rest”.
Dispose of Waste Properly
At minimum we pack out what we pack in! And better yet, we leave areas even cleaner than before we entered. Once, we even had a “cat hole” derby – a relay race style where everyone dug holes as a “toilet” 200ft from a water source or campsite. We have also engaged in Community Clean Up Programs beyond our site.
Leave What You Find
This is one of the most challenging principles to follow and understand for our students. After finding a really fascinating fossil or shell, we are often asked, “Can I keep it?” This experience usually begins an interesting conversation where we (together) weigh the options and make a decision about “keeping nature”. These challenging conversations* exist because children are naturally drawn to nature and have such a strong desire to keep it (and show someone at home!) and when we acknowledge this connection and explore it together, children are usually pretty good at letting nature be nature, or putting it in a special place and adding it to our class map, or taking a photo and looking at it later. This engagement further compliments their desire for storytelling and reminiscing.
But sometimes we do take things with us back to the classroom so we can study it and use it as a sample so we don’t have to take others, like bee hives and feathers. And sometimes, after our thorough dialogue, students will decide to take something special home. And that’s okay. Because for us it’s about a balance and knowing. And we believe it is important to reinforce student’s interest in nature and empower their connection with, and curiosity for, nature.
*Some helpful guidelines for us during these conversations look like: Imagine the person who found this before you took it home and you weren’t able to find it? Should we leave this for someone else to discover? And pretty soon, some of the students who have been exposed to Leave No Trace Principles are guiding others on the importance of why we should leave things where they are, allowing us to step back!
Minimize Campfire Impacts We have campfires almost every week in our designated fire pits. Once in a while, we’ll practice LNT fires and return our area back to how it was beforehand ensuring that we choose our site appropriately to minimize impact. We’ll even use pie tins to ensure no plants are harmed when we make small, practice fires.
Respect Wildlife
Last year we shut down one of our campsite’s (now known as Ducky’s Campsite) because a Mallard made it’s nest there. We avoid areas known for nesting at certain times of year (ie. bank swallows), practice catch and release while fishing, and generally observe animals from a distance. We do get close to insects, and do our best to not interfere. We’ve even seen students impose their own limits when catching frogs by washing their hands, having short time restrictions on how long they can stay in the bucket, or holding them close to the ground. In this way, it’s not a complete “hands-off” approach, but a respectful approach.
Be Considerate of Other Visitors
Other people use our area often – weddings, the museum, dog walkers and more. We follow these principles to ensure others have the opportunity to love this place like we do. And we always strive to be inclusive of people and courteous, the students love when given the opportunity to take people on tours of our special areas.
These are just some examples of how we try to encourage a low environmental impact. In practice, these usually come in teachable moments, where students weigh out options and feel empowered to make a choice.
ie “What else might have a stake in these grapes? How many could/should we eat?”
And sometimes it’s just about FUN. When it comes down to it, we know that people won’t protect what they don’t love or know. And how can we truly know something without really getting into it? And really getting into it is bound to have an effect.
So, this “acceptable level of impact“ thing – it’s all subjective. It’s a dynamic process that happens in the moment that’s inclusive of everyone and everything around – it’s a continuously open dialogue. It’s about role-modelling and nurturing our students’ (and our own) ecological identities. It’s about discovering our connection, values and sense of self in nature. It’s an appreciation and sense of belonging. And it looks different for everyone.
Given our quick switch to cold temperatures and snow last Friday, we thought it’d be a good time to revisit winter wear. First and foremost we want to recognize the awesome efforts of parents and guardians last week to ensure your children were dressed properly to enjoy the wonderful Winter-esque day! It’s because of your forethought and preparation that we were able to maximize our fun and learning.
At Forest School, we spend the majority of the day outside and there’s a saying in the outdoor world that there’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad gear. As our days become colder, we live by one simple rule – stay warm and dry. And while we do a lot to cut the chill – fires, hand and toe warmers, heated classroom, tea/hot drinks, keeping active – the best defense is our clothing.
Layers is the name of the game and we want to choose clothing that wicks moisture, dries fast, insulates our bodies and is waterproof and breathable. The 3 Basic Layers:
The base layer – the layer next to your skin. Avoid cotton – synthetic and merino wool fabrics work best. These fabrics wick moisture away from your skin to your outer layers so it can evaporate. They also dry quickly. When it’s really cold, it’s common to wear 2 base layers: a lightweight or middle weight layer, then a thicker heavyweight layer.
The middle layer – keeps you warm! Fleece or microfleece shirts/pants, and jacket (a goose down jacket or similar).
The outer layer – the “shell”. This is your water- and windproof layer and is breathable. Think Gore-Tex, or other polyurethane-coated fabrics with vents (core/underarm) that help release heat. Remember snow pants as well!
taken from https://www.shutterstock.com/image-vector/cold-weather-layered-clothes-flat-vector-458523721
Now for the rest of our body:
Hats: “If your feet are cold, put on a hat”. Like our parents always told us, we lose a significant amount of body heat through the top of our head. It’s imperative that this is a warm toque, not one with holes like crochet.
Neck Warmers: Often overlooked, but integral to keeping cheeks and noses warm! Please don’t forget this one! (Or substitute a balaclava.)
Gloves and mittens: A must have and extras in case they get wet.
Goggles and glasses: It is windy at Bygone Day’s and these offer both protection from the from sun and wind. With kids we’ve found goggles to be a great choice.
Socks: Wear a thin layer next to your skin and a second layer over it, both made of merino wool or a synthetic fabric. Ensure that boots are not too tight – they won’t keep feet warm. Extras are essential.
Boots: Warm winter boots that are waterproof and insulating are essential. Back up inserts (or Bama Socks) are suggested as well!
Some of these can be costly – we like to visit our local thrift stores and you’d be surprised at the quality gear you can pick-up there!
Remember, we need to stay well hydrated, too, so don’t forget a water bottle. Hot lunches like soups, or hot drinks like tea or hot chocolate can make a big difference, too.
Our goal is to have fun and learn, and ultimately we can’t if we’re cold. Let us know if you need any tips or check out our gear list here.
For children, outdoor play is a basic need and inherent to play is the necessity of risk. Risky play takes many different shapes, but always involves pushing limits and comfort zones in a thrilling and exciting way. It’s about testing oneself – and finding out what happens.
During risky play, children not only experience an element of danger – actual or perceived – but they also risk receiving the potential benefits. Risky play is integral to whole-child development, well-being and health. It helps children develop self-esteem, confidence and their socio-emotional self. Risky play helps develop physical literacy in children and cognitive skills. Moreover, it helps children learn how to manage risks and be safe – this is why it is so important!
At FS Forest and Nature School we engage children in six categories of risky play (Sandseter, 2007):
PLAY AT GREAT HEIGHTS
Ever notice that if there is anything to be climbed, kids will climb it? Playgrounds, trees, slopes or rock walls at Metcalfe, it will be climbed.
ROUGH AND TUMBLE
Think back to when you were a kid – fencing with sticks? Wrestling with friends? Rolling around in snow? This type of play is a balance between play and real fighting.PLAY AT
PLAY WITH DANGEROUS TOOLS
Saws, knives, hammers and drills. Whittling or cutting firewood. Though supervised these are potentially dangerous and we learn to respect and use these tools with care – and never before 10 AM (too sleepy!) or after 2PM (again, sleepy time).
PLAY WITH A CHANCE OF “GETTING LOST”
This happens when children are given a chance to be alone, disappear and even perceive being disappearing.
PLAY AT GREAT SPEEDS
Paddling a river, or riding a bike – the risk of crashing or flipping or just simply falling off.
PLAY NEAR DANGEROUS ELEMENTS
Water, cliffs, rocky trails and forests are all part of our landscape and where we play every day.
