Free Spirit Forest and Nature School

Nurturing Connection with Self, Others and Nature

Music is everywhere!

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Hi Folks,

Thanks for stopping by for another great day at Forest and Nature School, and with all this beautiful weather we didn’t waste any time. We welcomed all of students with the sound of ukuleles, which led to lots of singing and our students even playing their own tunes this morning. We are always encouraging our students to express themselves through song, dance, art or story telling, and we welcome more instruments every week!

Our students were in full swing this morning playing child led games, working on our hunting and hiding skills, which make our students amazing trackers and are even starting to build relationships that embody respect, communication and genuine empathy. We have so much to learn from each other and this is why we encourage our older students to spend time with our younger students, which naturally happens and the learning is abundant!

Today we challenged our younger students and continue to wander and explore our new Forest School home, and while all of our students work on core routines, each students day unfolds differently. Some students focused on the little things like catching new creatures (tree frogs, millipedes, caterpillars, cicadas, and one legged grasshoppers!). Plants were a big topic today from ground mushrooms to acorns falling from the sky, along with which animals we can catch (chipmunks and squirrels). Some of our other students worked on construction projects, identification, journals, art work, ultimate hiking, tracking and we even started collecting Cicada exoskeletons!

We continue to build our school map which lead us to all of our amazing finds and continue to make the Blueberry trails our own personal magic forest. We look forward to seeing everyone next week to make some more music!

Travis and Krista

There’s a lot of noise in silence

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Hey Everyone,

Our older groups this week geared up for their first field trip of the year – a paddle down the Beaver River. Collectively, the groups paddled anywhere from the Epping put in to the Slabtown Dam. The Fall colours were stunning and seemed to intensify as the week went on. All groups learned basic canoe skills, with our older students having the chance to learn to stern – and they nailed it!

Along the way, we took breaks for moments of silence in hopes of developing the Quiet Mind (one of our indicators of awareness) in our children. Of course we learned quickly that there is a lot of noise in silence. We were rewarded with the soft ripples of the current, wind blowing in the leaves, birds chirping, bugs singing and so much more. We were even visited by a Great Blue Heron, who seemed to travel with us every day – our guardian on the water.

Of course the highlight for many were the salmon running up river. If you have the chance, take your kids and go see them jump at the Slabtown Dam – it’s incredible right now.

Our Chickadee programs spent their days exploring Bygone days. Monday’s group dove into mapping as they created new homes and mapped bridges in hopes the Trolls will move in. Friday’s group was out paddling, building dams and got a sweet intro to fire making!

THanksgiving

It’s the perfect time of year to reflect on Thanksgiving as one of our core routines. At FNS we practice an attitude of gratitude and start everyday with what we are thankful for and we’ve found most students are eager to do so. It’s amazing what the kids come up with and share!

Throughout the day, we also find opportunities to give nods of thanks as we go about exploring. Each day ends with our airing of appreciations where students can thank one another, nature or anything else in our closing circle. It’s all about finding in ourselves a grateful heart.

And with that we’d like to extend a HUGE thanks to Jim, our Beaver River expert and friend for coming along with us this week to help out! And of course all the folks at Free Spirit in Heathcote for the help over the week.

Have a great long weekend!

The FNS crew

Pics:

The Adventure Begins…

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Hey Everyone!

First off from all of us at FSFNS, a HUGE welcome (or welcome back) to all of our new students, parents, guardians and friends of Forest and Nature School! We are extremely excited for this upcoming year and all of the adventures that are waiting to be had. If you are new to our program and reading this for the first time, welcome to our weekly(ish) blog that recaps some of the highlights, learning and stories from our past week. We publish all of our blogs to our Facebook page, along with pictures and upcoming events, so be sure to follow us by clicking here.

As this was our first week back at FNS, we focused heavily on community building and getting to know one another. We wandered and explored all over our 86 acres of property; searching out new and exciting discoveries. Each day a different story unfolding as we followed emerging student interests. If, and when, we found something significant, students could add it to our giant Forest School Map. These discoveries could be anything from a good climbing tree, to trails, to a special frog place – anything students felt connected to.

Mapping is one of our Core Routines at FNS. In a nutshell, we like to always be oriented to the compass directions and understand our landscape from a bird’s eye view. We draw maps not only to locate features, but also to tell stories of the areas we explore. Students name the places we go – fossil mountain, maple forest, golf ball trail – that reinforce connection with the areas and give us a common language to use. It’s not about creating the perfect map, but rather engaging in the process. It’s something we look at every week – check out the map in our classroom the next time you are in!

Wandering is another one of our core routines. Sometimes, we like to set off and explore without an agenda or destination, or even purpose. The point is to be present in the moment – not worry about time and simply follow the curiosity.

And curiosity took us many places this week! We hiked along trails, set-up forts in the forest, chased after bugs and identified them in field guides, went canoeing, fishing, created dams, made fires and so much more.

It was a good kick-off to the year! Thanks for joining us on our first week of FSFNS!

Cheers,

Your FNS Team
(Aislinn, Matt, Michelle and Krista)

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Bubbles, Hikes and an Unexpected Letter

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Hey Everyone,

We had a sunny day at FNS today and what better way to start than with giant bubbles (and they seriously could’ve done this all day)! But alas, when we checked our mailbox, a special letter had arrived from Queen Sadie of the Fairies of Grape Valley. They needed our help – after that huge winter storm just a few weeks ago (crazy eh?!), their homes and village had been destroyed and they needed us to lend a hand to rebuild. They gave us a map marked with red stars that showed us where to find special materials along the way and we were off. After arriving, students were busy at work creating homes, docks, restaurants, roadways and even helicopter landing pads for the fairies. The fairies will be quite pleased with all their efforts.

Sidebar: The swallows have moved back into to the cliff of Fossil Mountain and it is incredible! We took a breather and just watched them go about their day.

On the way back, we followed one of our brand new trails (thanks Rad Adventures!) through Maple Forest and got a peak at some newly accessible areas to us. We eventually dove off trail and stumbled upon a brand new space we aptly named Spiky Forest. We were treated to trout lilies and garlic mustard along the way to tide us over until we made it back for lunch.

After a picnic lunch we had some (optional) barefoot time! It’s such a great way for us to connect to nature, and your kids might have some dirty soles tonight. We read one of our favourite books (Everyone Needs a Rock – Byrd Baylor) and then went on a search to find the perfect stone. These rocks became our students gratitude rocks – ask them about it!

We slowed down at the end of the day and took some time to be quiet in nature and focus on senses other than sight, after which it was time for our Story of the Day (debrief).

Enjoy this awesome weather!

Cheers,

Matt and Krista

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More mud, Maps and Bunny Seeds!

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Hey Everyone!

Our Chickadees spent the beautiful sunny day doing what we do best: exploring! After our core routines (and some hammock time, loose parts, and slacklining) we headed out to our sit spots, only to be sidetracked by emergent interests: climbing the tire mountain, making our way across the balance beam to the army crawl and up and over the “portal of discovery” and eventually over to Lakeside View. And this is where the imaginations and building came together for a magical morning.

Building off last weeks Mud Meals, students created a new “oven” ( an old cabinet flipped on its side with drawn on burners and wood chip buttons). A quick run back to the school house and we had pots, trays, spoons and spatulas. Next thing we knew we were treated to “Chocolate Soup” and Sumac candle Mud Cake complete with a stellar rendition of Happy Birthday!

All that work made us hungry, and after lunch, during our unstructured play, the wind blew us something special: a secret map! We followed the map to find hidden eggs the Easter Bunny had left filled with vegetable seeds! So we planted them and took them home to see what we can grow.

Have a happy Easter Everybody!

Matt and Sandi

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Sledding down “contour lines”

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Hi Folks,

We certainly had an awesome time this week at FNS! We learned about wilderness travel and the important parts of a map (making our own treasure maps around the site), honed our compass skills and navigated an orienteering course that some students worked hard to create for us! This course eventually led us to our dear Fossil Mountain – where we examined some contour lines up close… with our toboggans!

We had quite the range of weather this week, allowing us to get our mitts deep into some fun and creative snow structures. We built some epic snow castles and GIANT snowballs, livened up the designs with food colouring, and even raced down hills in our home-made sleds, GT’s and crazy carpets! By Friday, we could feel the sun trying hard to melt our creations, sparking imagination from our learners as they transformed a quinzee to an exploding volcano. It was a blast all week and our students were well prepared and eager to play in the first steady snow week.

Our students are already learning a lot about what it takes to brave the Winter. They are getting their practice at making and sustaining fires in the Winter, being prepared with their own Winter gear (and know the importance of back-up mitts and boots), and are especially making sure we keep hydrated, even though it’s cold out! Big thanks to everyone who made our first snow week such a success!

Speaking of all of this snow, don’t forget to sign up for our winter session! Click here to register!

Cheers,

Matt, Kim and Tamara

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Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Life is best traveled with Friends

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Getting “Red in the Shed” to find our way.

Hey Everyone!

We had such a blast exploring this week! After learning the cardinal directions and compass basics, it was time for studying maps… and what better way than an all out East vs West game of capture the flag? Students divided territory, created boundaries and marked key locations on the map before they were set loose in the playing field. Teamwork, honesty, attack-defense strategy and some good physical endurance was the name of the game.

Afterwards, the students were challenged with mini-orienteering courses that looped back on themselves. All students excelled at this and were soon up against the “ultimate” orienteering challenge that spread property-wide. After finding their direction of travel and getting the “Red in the Shed”, students were off to the races. The group was able to complete this challenge with ease, and all this before lunch!

And they are off on the Orienteering Challenge!

Our next challenge would take us off property to the Eleventh Line trails for an afternoon of hiking and Geocaching. With the help of our GPS’s (a big thanks to Healthy Kids Community Challenge for lending us these!), we were able to uncover 2 Geocaches!

GPS in hand, off to find the treasure.

If you’ve never geocached, it’s a wonderful way to spend time outside. Think giant, worldwide scavenger hunt using GPS technology – it can even been done through an app on your phone or borrow one from the Collingwood Library! Check out geocaching.com.

We are pleased to announce that EVERYONE earned their Travel Beads this week! We also gave out 1 Teaching Bead for a lesson on animal calls, two Reflection Beads, and a Nature Lover Bead – Congrats!

Next Week:
Survival Skills! If you have any (preferably) plastic containers that can be used as a fire kit please send it (or them) along! Thanks! (Small peanut butter jars are best as they screw shut and are waterproof, but anything similar will do!)

Have a great week,

Kim and Matt

More photos to download and share:

Oh the places you will go

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Hi Friends!

“Congratulations! Today is your day. You’re off to great places! You’re off and away! You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose” – Dr. Suess

Our focus this week was mapping! Giving our students the ability to read and understand a map gives them opportunities for growth, confidence, amazing memories and fun! We kept our adventures close to the Thornbury area visiting the Craigleith Heritage Depot and an awesome hiking trail in Clarksburg.

Check out our day!

This morning we started the day off with show and tell. We had a range of special items from homemade natural art, home made medallion drawings, finger puppets, rocks and a Pokémon ball. There was no Pokémon in this ball.

Before we headed out on our adventure, we took time to discuss how to read a map. We looked at titles, legends, symbols, roads, trails, names and so much more.

Our first stop was the Craigleith Heritage Depot. Some of our students went right to the library to read “Charlottes Web” and “A funny thing happened on the way to school”. Some ventured to the museum and learned about Trilobites, the First Nations Petun tribe and the Train station. While others took some time to search for images of Wolves. If you have never been to this location before please take advantage of the incredible learning opportunities here. You won’t regret it! A big shout out to the Craigleith Depot for being such a great host!

On our second stop we found this amazing shelter! We took some time to play a game called “hunter and wolf”but by the end of the game it turned into “Cops and Robbers”. While we were exploring this new hiking trail we came across a rock mountain. We took time to search for fossils and found more great hiking sticks!

In the afternoon we started with a challenging scavenger hunt. Our students were given a map with check points to visit. At every check point there was a question about Forest school that they had to answer. Along with every question they gathered materials for their own personal fire. It was great to see teamwork arise and our older students even helped out our younger ones with sounding out words and making sure they all got the right answers! Great work guys and gals!

We finished our day with a riddle which led our students to a treasure! Make sure you asked your child how much treasure they found and what they got to keep!

Our riddle was:

“Into a fort you go where the treasure is aflow. Better hurry up and run because the treasure is a ton.”

We gave away 2 craft beads today and everyone is getting very close to getting a prize for their respect stickers. Great job everyone!

Next Week: Survival Week! We will focus on shelter, drinking, food, fire…it’s going be a busy day next week!

Thanks for stopping by!

Krista

Bonus Pictures

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

And we’re off!

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Hey Folks!

A big welcome to all our new students this year and a big welcome back to all our Forest School returners! Every week, we’ll be posting a summary and photos here of all the adventures our Snowy Owls and Painted Turtles get up to. It is our hope to try and capture all those moments of exploration, learning and good old fashioned fun on here to share with you.

We (Kim and Matt) are privileged to be the Tuesday and Wednesday teachers for the Collingwood branch of Free Spirit Forest School. Although we have a basic outline we follow each day, one of the greatest things about emergent learning is we never know where it is going to take us. And thus you will certainly read about slight variations in our days.

This week our focus was on getting to know our school house, the land we are using, our learning community and our daily routines. After creating our nature medallions, we started our day off like we will every week with the students participating in a smudging ceremony using white sage. We do this to honour the cultural history of the area as well as cleanse ourselves of negativity in order to set the tone for the day.

After some community building, the students were then introduced to some of the tools that we use including our sticker charts (which are tied to the Seven Grandfather Teachings) and our Bead Ceremony. The Bead Ceremony is an ongoing project where students will earn beads for various hard, soft and creative skills that learn. For more information on specific beads, please click here.

Just before lunch, we headed out on a hike around a portion of the property to get to know it better. The students brought along their journals a mapped out the village and the surrounding area. We have a giant group map that we are creating together with all the special places we discover along the way.

After lunch, we headed out to choose our sit spots and spend some alone time in nature. These spots will play an important part throughout the year at Forest School as we will be visiting them weekly with different activities to do. We followed this up with the extreme race course – crawling through tubes, balancing on beams, army crawling under a fence, then hopping over walls – and all in under 30 seconds!

Throughout the day, we had some great moments of curiosity and exploration, too. From our students ripping up old diseased tomato plants to save the others; to climbing trees, catching frogs and naming swans; from sweltering heat, to running around in the pouring rain; from sharing legends and stories, to slurping down watermelon and spitting the seeds out as far we could. We had a blast and are looking forward to the upcoming semester!

We have a great group of kids this year and are excited to see where it will take us. We are always open to suggestions and want you to be involved as much as possible. Please let us know if you have any ideas or resources we can use to enhance your child’s learning.

That’s all for this week, check out the photos below! Next week we’ll be diving into Leave No Trace ethics.

Thanks,

Matt and Kim

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