Free Spirit Forest and Nature School

Nurturing Connection with Self, Others and Nature

Getting dirty with bugs!

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Hello Folks!

Today we welcomed a new student named Izzy to our Forest School by introducing the smudging ceremony experience with her while explaining the meaning of it.

A Creepy Crawly bug day was the name of the game this week! Throughout the day the kids observed and held: spiders, centipedes, worms, banana slugs, frogs, fish, hornets, pink mushrooms, and much more!

Our students were excited this morning and hiked to the back of our property to find the floor of our shelter was missing! WHAT? Yes our floor went missing! After searching the property and coming up with possible solutions we were unable to find our floor which was also a great thing because our kids had the opportunity to create a new structure. This one is stronger, accessible for all students and even has it’s own fireplace! We even tested out the new fire pit by roasting marshmallows in it. They sure were tasty and we only lost 3 to the fire.

Next on the agenda was to create a worm compost. Our students brought in newspaper, egg cartons, saw dust, and food scraps. Then we went on a worm hunt, which started out with a discussion as to where these worms like to hang out. That would be dark damp areas, loose dirt, compost bins, and near to the surface!

Tip: If your soil is dry grab a hose and run some water over the ground, wait about a half hour, and the worms should rise up.

Our goal with our worm compost is to check in each week and see how they are doing. Are they mixing up the layers or compost and newspapers? Have they eaten anything? Do they need more compost? Is the soil wet or dry? After we are done with our findings we plan on putting these hard workers back into the ground by adding them into our existing compost.

We discussed our favorite bugs today and because our school is home to hundreds of bugs, we thought it would be awesome to create a bug hotel! The students collected: pinecones, dry grass, deadwood, fallen tree bark, empty tissue paper rolls, dirt, and newspaper to build the hotel. There was thought and discussion that went into the planning of which insects would like certain habitats. The kids will visit this area on a weekly basis and conduct their observations within their journals.

All of our kids worked really hard this week on their Respect, Bravery, and Honesty stickers. Next week we look forward to giving away a couple more beads!

Next Week: Is all about Tree Identification and First Nation totem pole exploration!

Thank-you for stopping by, we will se you next week!

Krista

Our Fall Harvest!

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Hey Folks,

With the autumn looming this week we celebrated our “Fall Harvest” at Forest School. The whole day revolved around harvesting food, working as a community and sharing a meal together.

We searched the property and to our pleasant surprise were able to not only uncover a few awesome pear trees, but also some apple trees scattered throughout the forest. Preserving was the word of the day so we set to dehydrating the pears we picked from the tree to make ourselves some chewy fruit snacks. This was a big hit among students!

During an exploratory hike around the property, the Snowy Owls (with the help of some keen Painted Turtles), were able to fill a bag of apples – and discover sour wild grapes, red clover, Queen Anne’s Lace [wild carrot], and a patch of strawberries for the spring too! Even through hardship (a journey through the newly named “prickly” mountain – full of thistles!) we trekked on and were later rewarded with 100% pure, local apple sauce prepared with love over the fire. All the students were able to bring a jar home, so be sure to try it!

Our final project today was to create “Stone Soup” over the fire. We would like to send out a big thanks to all students who brought in some home grown (or neighbour/grandparent grown!) veggies. Our veggies included kale, cucumber, tomatoes (from our School Garden from last year!), garlic, potatoes, onions and much more. The soup was a HUGE success and one of the tastier ones we’ve ever had. All students had a hand in the prep work and the cooking and therefore all earned their Cooking Beads! Congratulations.

In addition to the food, our day focused on the 7 Grandfather Teachings. Using legends and discussions, students learned about Love, Truth, Honesty, Humility, Respect, Wisdom and Bravery. They made connections in their own lives and at Forest School (in fact our whole sticker system is based on these Teachings). Furthermore, students spent a good amount of time in their sit spots, balancing on our slackline, and working together to build a brand new fire pit area (as our old one was invaded by poison ivy)! We even had time to set up our own seed library for use next year. What a busy and productive day!

Congrats to our first ever “Teaching Bead” recipient for an awesome lesson in making origami. And a big welcome to our two new (but returning) students!

Next Week:

FIELD TRIP! We are going to be paddling next week and have a water focused theme. Please send along a bathing suit for your children so they can enjoy the water. Boats, paddles, and life jackets will be provided but if you have your own PFD feel free to bring it. Drop -off and pick-up will be as usual at Bygone Days!

Have a great week!

Kim and Matt

7 Grandfather Teachings

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Hello again!

Thanks for checking in this week! With Summer put to bed and Fall around the corner our students focused on our First Nations 7 Grandfather Teachings, the Medicine Wheel and spent time in nature discovering their artistic side.

As always the students started the day off with free play/discovery and a First Nation Smudging Ceremony. One student wanted to pass around the smoking sage to all his fellow students which he did while all the other students respected the ceremony and were quiet and respectful.

Our students thought it would be a great idea to contribute to the 7 Grandfather Teachings and write nice things about each other. This positive information will be inserted into their journals as a reminder of how awesome they are! We also enjoyed a great hike around the property finding wild grapes (the kids did not like the sour ones), hornets nests, hand sized frogs and discovered a fish in the river which they caught and released.

We focused on our land and what it provides for us. The students created a map about what they think our grounds look like and came up with many designs and creations. They even created their own names for their spots such as “The Village,” Frog Town and Playground. We hiked to the back of our property and they spent some time creating dreamcatchers. The kids weren’t even scared of the Spider Woman legend! We then spent time telling stories around the campfire about bears.

Throughout the day we focused on the 7 Grandfather Teachings – which also represent our sticker system – ask them about it! Our students strive for these morals and values for every class and try to bring them into their everyday life.

Love – Eagle
Honesty – Jenu
Respect – Buffalo
Truth – Turtle
Courage – Bear
Wisdom – Beaver
Humility – Wolf

Our last goal was to visit the Farmers Pantry to visit local animals – goats, chickens, donkeys, ducks, lambs, and very large bunnies. They all picked grass and hay and got right in there to help feed the animals. We also went to pick fresh locally grown Macintosh apples. The kids ate more apples than they could pick while some students pretended they were lost and had to climb to the top of the trees to find their way out!

We did! Phew.

A shout out to one of our students that brought in a very special fossil he found while on a hike. After a couple fun guesses of what type of foot print it was – velociraptor or baby T-rex, we came to the conclusion it was some form of bird. We are still trying to figure it out! We also gave away a NEW bead this week – The storytelling bead. Thanks Jack for bringing in your foot fossil!

Next Week:

FIELD TRIP: We are focusing on water week! Please bring extra clothes and a towel just incase, because we will be canoeing down the Beaver River in the afternoon! Pick up time will be as usual.

What we will be providing: Boats, life jackets, and paddles. If your student had their own PFD please feel free to bring it along.

See you next week!

Krista

If we leave no trace, no one will know we were here!

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Hello all!

Thank you for checking in this week, for another amazing forest school day! We first started by welcoming 2 NEW students with open arms and curiosity about our grounds and play areas.

We started our day, just like every day with a smudging ceremony followed by free play and check ins about our week. We then jumped into a fun game called “The Lorax” created by local students from Collingwood’s Forest School. After we were done with our game, we got comfortable in our greenhouse and read the amazing story “The Giving Tree”. Our students then had a discussion about how the story made them feel and what they thought the meaning of the book was.

After our snack we dove right into our Leave No Trace principles. Our students learned all about the 7 Principles and have become very interactive about discussions and activities that tied it all together. They learned what it takes to plan a trip and how much you need to take with you. Also, how to respect our wildlife with given examples of how they would achieve certain goals. As well as campfire rules and how to be respectful to other people who are trying to enjoy nature as well.

Plan ahead
Stick to the Trails
Dispose your waste (Trash and Poop)
Leave what you find
Minimize campfire impacts
Respect Wildlife
Be considerate of others

After lunch our students continued on our 7 principles, and then proceeded to catch frogs (now learning about LNT the frogs were set free back into their homes), slugs, and built forts. There was an abundance of communication, teamwork, leaders, questions, concentration, self-confidence, and motivation. We also learned 3 legends.

Coyote takes water from the Frogs
How the deer got his horns
Coyote and Skunk

Our awesome day came to end with students receiving our FIRST of many beads. This was a huge deal for our students that worked so hard for them! We gave away the “N” bead for Leave NO Trace, along with stickers for our students that ranged from Respect, Bravery, Wisdom, Love and Humility.

Thank you for checking in this week. Next week we are going to dive into the 7 Grandfather Teachings, Native art, and we get to pick our power animals!

Thanks for stopping in!

Krista

“Pond”er this!

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Hey Everyone,

We spent our days this week with two classical elements: Fire and Water (and I suppose the Earth and Wind as well). After measuring our tomato plants for growth, it was time for the much anticipated attempt at the Fire Bead.

After a review of the basic needs of fire (heat, oxygen, and fuel), we were off to the back fields for students to show off their skills. Students partnered up, selected their site and were given three matches to create a small fire that would burn long enough to roast a marshmallow. They gathered tinder, kindling and bigger pieces of wood just like we practiced (and a water bucket… safety first!) They built teepees, keeping in mind the 3 d’s – dead, down and dry wood. Within half an hour, ALL students were enjoying their marshmallows on the fire. Some were even able to light it using one match! Needless to say, everyone earned their Fire Bead!

The afternoon saw a visit to Black Ash Creek to discover the creatures it held. The students jumped right in (quite literally!) with sieves and nets, and quickly filled our buckets with various little critters. At first, we found a lot of the usual – striders, minnows and crayfish (even one with eggs under her tail!), but soon we had the magnifying glasses out and were identifying a whole bunch of new ones. We found a ton of mayfly larvae, an interesting, somewhat scary looking creature. Then came the elusive dobsonfly larvae, a hard character to identify. Finally, an intense looking predacious diving beetle, or more commonly known as the “water tiger”. We even caught a baby snapping turtle on Thursday! In true Forest School and LNT fashion, all the creatures were returned to their homes soon after making our observations and classifications.

Next week is Rock Climbing! All the gear will be provided, but if you have your own feel free to bring it. We recommend wearing running shoes too. As mentioned, we (Kim and Matt) won’t be there as we are off in the woods on canoe trips, but the students are lucky enough to have some great leaders filling in! We look forward to hearing about it!

We’ll see you at the final ceremonies!

Matt and Kim

Leave nothing but footprints, take nothing but memories

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Hey Everyone!

We are once again happy to welcome new students to our program this week, and a big thanks to current students for being so welcoming.

Given that this is Earth week culminating with Earth Day on Friday, we thought what better way to celebrate than understanding how to minimize our environmental impact through Leave No Trace programming? The 7 principles of LNT promote responsible outdoor recreation with the hope of inspiring respect for (and stewardship of) natural spaces. For more info please click here.

Though our two days were slightly different, they both unfolded using these principles, so let’s recap one at a time.

1. Know Before You Go
We set the scene: An exploratory hike later on in the afternoon to a new space on the property (off property on Thursday) we had yet to go. Our first goal? Being prepared to go into this wild place. We pulled out an empty backpack and asked the students what we needed to bring. They chose from things scattered around the property and made sure we had everything possible that we would need, from sunscreen to water, to a compass and map, even marshmallows in case we got lost. We were ready for anything.

2. Choose the right path
Essentially this means stay on the trail and camp on durable surfaces. We played a great team-building game to highlight the importance of not straying from the path. The students had to find their way across a grid path, with only one correct way. Step on the wrong square, and you just squashed an endangered species (or got poison ivy, or stuck in quicksand, etc)! Finally, all students made it through the secret path to the durable campsite, and were so excited we had to do it again.

3. Respect Wildlife
At lunchtime, the teachers played obnoxious visitors. Their target? The herd of snowy owls and red tailed hawks eating quietly in the sun. While one teacher stayed back the required 200 feet with binoculars, the other got much too close, was much too loud and even fed the animals candy! No worries though – he was eventually taken down by the pack. Afterwards, this activity led to a very insightful debrief with the students drawing important parallels with the natural world.

4. Trash is Trash
We started with a visualization of a special place the students had. Then we asked what would ruin this for them. Garbage was the number one answer (followed closely by noise). So on our epic hike the students brought along bags and did a shoreline clean-up (around the other side of Willow Lake Wednesday; bay front clean-up on Thursday with Transition Collingwood and a class from CCI). Multiple full garbage bags worth of trash and recycling were collected! Students are also well aware that we pack out what we pack in.

5. Respect Others
Now known as “love your neighbour”, the students had a good discussion around the fire and in the classroom about how we can respect other people who are enjoying nature as well. The big rule: Don’t let our fun ruin other people’s fun.

6. Be careful with fire!
We are always careful with fire, but this week we learned how to make sure we have fires that leave minimal impacts for the environment. Never burn garbage, always use existing fire pits when possible, clean it up after, only use dead, down and dry wood… students were already well aware of this. One new thing we tried though was cooking on a camp stove. We made a delicious apple cider.

7. Leave what you find
This was one of the harder lessons to learn and understand. We had the students build an art piece of natural materials to show off to the others. We did a gallery walk after, having everyone explain what they made. We then took away a rock or stick, without saying a thing, from each piece. The students reflected on this afterwards that it did not feel good to have their materials taken. This was a catalyst to talk about leaving things in nature for all people to enjoy and really hit home for some folks.

Emergent Learning Alert!
On Thursday we arrived to a mystery scene in front of the school house – fur, blood and scat. Students successfully identified the fur as rabbit and the scat gave away the culprit – a fox (it appears to have moved in under the church). We decided to take time to read a legend about life-cycles and the students were able to put a positive spin on this – the fox needed to feed her pups. We found more evidence of the rabbit and students wanted to hold an impromptu funeral for it (now known as “Blueberry”). The eulogies varied, but were all empathetic. We made a little tombstone, along with a fitting offering of blueberries and sage.

And that’s it – along with our normal sit spot time and other core routines, including free play, it was a busy day! For all their hard work today, students received Leave No Trace bag tags, stickers and our brand new “Leave No Tracer” bead.

Speaking of beads, this week we gave out 5 journaling beads and 2 craft beads, one for a stone/stick hammer and another for a 5 finger family. Congrats!

It’s time for planting in the next 2 weeks, so if your kid is looking through the compost for seeds, don’t be alarmed!

Until next time,
Matt and Kim

I speak for the trees

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Hey Folks!

It seems that spring has finally arrived which meant a couple of welcomed sunny, warm days at Forest School. This week, we focused on trees – beginning with one of our favourite games, Sappy Sappy, to get the energy flowing.

After our initial check-ins, smudge ceremony and some yoga, the students paired up and took turns blindfolding and leading each other to a random tree in our area. It was up to the blindfolded student to collect as much information as possible with their other senses about the tree, give it a big hug, then try to find it after being returned to the starting point to remove the blindfold. For the most part, everyone was able to find their special tree – different barks, needles, sizes and smells were all good indicators.

Afterwards, we sat down and spent some time reading the “Lorax”. We are beginning to encourage a stewardship of the land for students and what story could be better? The students had a lot of great reflections about the story, and it even turned into a game of hide and seek, where the “Lorax” would hide behind a tree, and when found, would chase down all the “Oncelers” to stop them from cutting down trees (see Lorax Tag).

Also on Wednesday, the students eagerly jumped in to help our friend Al clean up all the down branches and twigs from the ice storm a few weeks ago. What a great, spontaneous opportunity for service-learning and taking responsibility of the land we use.

Before lunch we visited our sit spots with our journals in hand and a new task: Adopt-a-Tree. Students chose a tree nearby their spots and were asked to study it, name it and commit to taking care of their tree. With the help of ID books, students were able to figure out their type of tree and some facts about them. Some students on Thursday even created “adoption sheets” complete with all the useful information they could think of about their tree. When we got back to the school house, students presented their trees to the group enthusiastically, by sharing why their tree was so great and why they loved it. (The Snowy Owls have also been given “homework” to find out interesting facts about their tree to share with the group next week.)

The afternoon saw an opportunity for exploration and free-play. Free-play happens daily at the school, and it’s always intriguing to observe and see how the children interact, imagine and cooperate. It was fun to quietly watch on Thursday as games emerged with rules first created, then talked about, tried out and then sometimes changed. On Wednesday, students chose to take on a huge undertaking to make a snowman from the last remaining pile of snow (thanks to the shade from our trees)! An incredible amount of teamwork and communication was needed to lift the second ball on top of the first.

Later on, after a bit more talk about trees, we headed out to the fire pit. By popular demand, we furthered our learning on fire making and took the first steps towards earning fire beads. Student made “nests” from dry grass, sawdust, lint and birch bark. The students were able to make fire in their nest using only a coal and blowing slowly. The next step will be flint and steel (which some students are already mastering) and char cloth.

It seems we fit a lot into the days this week – the sun sure was a great motivator in that!

Congrats to our bead recipients this week as well: 2 storytelling beads were earned and our our very first journaling/reflection bead!

A heads up, too – your child may be snooping around your leftover veggies and fruits for seeds to plant in the upcoming weeks.

See you next week!

Matt and Kim

“Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot. Nothing is going to get better. It’s not.” -The Lorax

The fire within (or “you had me at pancakes”)

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Hey Folks, happy Spring! And what a difference between Wednesday’s weather and Thursday freezing rain!

We learned all about fire this week, and are on our way to earning our fire bead. First off, a trip to the local fire station where students got to explore the station, engines, and learn about protective equipment and fire safety. Since we’ll be having lots of fires at Forest School, the students came prepared and eager with many questions to ask our local heroes. (Don’t be surprised if you child comes home and checks all the fire alarms!)

After lunch, we were back outside learning the exact steps in fire building. With journals in hand, students learned all about the things needed (heat, oxygen and fuel) to make a fire. The students eagerly collected their tinder, kindling and logs, and in no time we had a nice teepee fire blazing. Not even the freezing rain could stop our fire Thursday.

As a special treat, we cooked pancakes over the fire. The students were more than thrilled to add the maple sugar and syrup from our sugar shack visit three weeks ago. On Thursday, these came to be know as delicious “scram”cakes because we forgot the spatula.

This week also saw the implementation of two new systems: Our beads ceremony and sticker reward chart. Students now earn stickers for various categories (leadership, respect, listening, etc) and when they fill their chart, they receive an incentive.

Beads (see core routines) will also be earned by students for developing both hard and soft skills. Now we don’t normally send homework home with the students, but there are a couple opportunities for students to work on earning their beads at home – if they want. Some the skills (fire, knots, etc) can always be practiced at home, but there are 2 beads that can be earned at home: the craft and storytelling beads.

The craft bead is ANYTHING creative the student wants to make and bring in and share with the class. It could be a bird feeder, dream catcher, painting, ANYTHING! Depending on what it is, we may even be able to all make one.

The storytelling bead is just that – telling a story/myth/legend/song/poem/anything around the fire to the group.

We know you are busy, and there is no time limit on this. If your child finds the time, that’s great, but it’s not mandatory.

See you next week, let’s hope for some sun.

Happy Easter!

Matt and Kim

Here Fishy, Fishy

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Hey Folks!

March Break didn’t stop us from going to school. This week, we welcomed brand new students to our school and now offer a Wednesday program in addition to Thursday! As an emergent-learning and student-centered program, both days unfolded in similar yet unique ways.

The Red Tailed Hawks and Snowy Owls were quite adventurous this week. After our regular check-ins and smudging ceremony, we spent some time learning about fish through interactive games, like a new favourite Fishy, Fishy. Some explorers were also able to spend some quality time in our sit spots and journal about things they saw and changes they noticed since the last time they were there.

Soon after, we were off to the Georgian Triangle Angler’s Association fish hatchery. Here we learned about the life cycles of fish by observing first-hand the GTAA’s efforts at enhancing populations of trout in the Georgian Triangle. The students were able to see, feed and hold (in nets) both brown and rainbow trout. The fish ranged in age from a couple months to almost two years and ready for release. Afterwards, we explored the creek and pond nearby to locate “escapees”.

Equally important as the hatchery itself was the connection the students could make to our own property. The GTAA will be releasing some fish in the student-named “Sugar Shack River” leading into “Willow Lake” at bygone days later on this year. This was exciting news for our students, with dreams of “catching huge fish!” in the lake.

WEDNESDAY

Our afternoons varied between the two days. Wednesday saw the students head over to “Fossil Mountain” and explore new frontiers of the property (which led to the discovery of the “Endless Desert” and “Sugar Shack River”). We had a lesson in erosion and river formation in the sand dunes, as well as damming. It got quite muddy!

Then it was off to build huts and a fire. Despite the rain (or maybe because of it), the students quickly set up natural shelters and a tarp to remain dry. We got a fire going, with everyone taking shot at making sparks with flint and steel.

THURSDAY

Thursday afternoon saw trust- and communication-building through a blindfolded hike. Then it was off to build a huge natural shelter to fit the whole team-so big in fact we weren’t able to finish it. The students quickly self-divided into roles (stick collectors, shelter builders, cleaners, grass-getters, etc) and in no time we had worked together to make a masterpiece.

Afterwards we celebrated with a fire and marshmallows. The students all had a chance to try using flint and steel and catch a spark on charcloth. They did very well, and this is a skill we will continue to work on.

All in all, a great week. We hope you are enjoying your March Break as much as we are!

Until next time,

Kim and Matt

If you’d like more information about the GTAA please click here to visit their website

Building Community, One (snowshoe) step at a time

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Hey Folks!

Our Snowy Owls and Red Tailed Hawks weren’t dissuaded by the cold temperatures this morning. They (quite literally) jumped right into the snowy day. Upon arrival, we strapped on our snowshoes and off we went.

After a quick hike, we paused for a smudging ceremony. We burned sage in an abalone shell and bathed ourselves in the smoke. This ceremony is used to “get rid of the bad and take in the good,” as one student summarized. Along with a cleansing, this was also a moment to acknowledge and honour the traditional territory of the Peton people – an interest we will continue to explore over the course of the program

Creating our group contracts

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Given the frigid morning temps, we decided to spend a little time warming up and getting to know each other better. The students came up with their nature names (with “Bernese Mountain Dog” being a popular choice thanks to our furriest FS member, Aden), we created group contracts, and began learning more about the history of the snowshoe. For lunch we were off to the Collingwood Public Library, where students read books and made up puppet shows. An awesome moment was watching some of our older Snowy Owls reading nature books to the younger Red Tails.

Our Snowy Owls sharing a story with the Red Tailed Hawks

As the day went on, the sun came out and the temperature rose. The groups split up and we spent our afternoon exploring our new surroundings by snowshoe. How lucky we were to have pristine, untouched snow to work our way though.

The Snowy Owls settled into the woods, where they built a stellar fire using all natural materials. Tinder (“Let’s use Birch Bark!”), Kindling (“Grab Sticks!”), Fuel (“We need big stuff too!”) – it’s amazing to see how much the children were able to share their prior knowledge with their peers. They cleared away the snow, created their Teepee (and later log) and got the fire going fairly quickly. The students learned about the three “D’s” when collecting wood: Dead, Down and Dry.

Enjoying our first fire together

The Red Tailed Hawks were off on their own snowshoe adventure. Along the way, they were able to follow animal tracks (including a rabbit, skunk, and or course, Aden). They were able to track the Snowy Owls and find out where they were by following their prints. They soon joined the Snowy Owls and we shared stories and legends around the fire.

The end of the day brought with it some lessons in camouflage and time for reflecting on the day with a little bit of journaling – drawing, writing, or both. The students were asked to express their favourite part of the day.

We very much enjoyed the day today and look forward to doing it all over again next week!

Kim and Matt

P.S. At forest school we are always looking for new ideas. If you or your child, has an idea of something to explore, please let us know!

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