Mother Nature sure did hand us a bag full of every type of weather this week, and we still loved every minute of it! Each day at Forest School always looks a little different and discoveries are always unfolding, but some things were consistent throughout our week – like how the snow makes sounds seem more dense, less birds and noise, our well known hikes have become more challenging and there is much more to discover and create in the snow.
Some of the highlights this week that we cannot forget are:
New Creations at Lakeside
Quicksand and Waterfalls
Legends and Plant Identification
Snowstorms
Discovering Duckies Camp site
Eagle eye on Fossil Mountain
Fire Building and Flint and Steel
Prospectors Tent
Dangerous Baby Squirrels
Raccoon Touch
New records with Fossil Mountain Sledding
Fan favourite Fox and Bunny game
Fort building with snow
We look forward to another great week ahead of us!
Another pretty awesome week we had, starting off with a pretty epic mud kitchen, some hard core obstacle course construction and our imagination even helped us become local farmers.
With all the rain this morning, our students were lucky and discovered 3 rainbows. We pondered about rainbows and why they appear after a rain storm. We all came to the conclusion it was a beautiful sight to see after the dark clouds moved past. This also allowed us to find all the Green Trees (Pine, Spruce, Cedar and Hemlock), which hold magical properties and special medicine. Mother Nature is pretty fascinating!
Our Chickadees ventured to a new part of the forest this week and discovered the Mysterious Forest which led into time spent alone, group play, magical powers of the world, new paths, train stations along with courage, patience and awareness of one self and the natural environment. Ending our day with an amazing puddle discovery full of splashing, jumping, running and laughing.
What an incredibly creative day we had! We were very curious students today and started looking at different types of creature and plants such as :
Red Spotted Purple (Butterfly)
Emerald Ash Borer
Wooly Bear American Dagger
Northern Oriole
We also love rain days because it gives our students the opportunity to dive into their imagination and creative side. We were big builders and inventors – from the tallest tower, pumpkin stoves, painting pictures and 3D replicas.
From carving pumpkins to eating toasted seeds, we even continue to get to know our forest. Finding new mushrooms, Downy Woodpeckers, Salamanders and new plants. We started to focus on the Green trees today, and used our owl eyes to find Spruce, Pine, Hemlock and Cedar. Some were easier finds than others, and we are still on the hunt for the Pine tree!
We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and we were excited to hear all about your child’s long weekend stories! Our question of the day was: What have you noticed in our environment? And we love hearing the answers because they always vary so much. Ranging from the colours of the leaves, no birds or sun in the sky, that it feels colder, or that they didn’t see any animals running around. This led into a great day full of imagination and role play.
We used our childlike wonders and jumped right into the role of animals that either hibernate or collect and store their food for the winter, but still stay active. Our day consisted of scavenging, predator and prey, den building and story telling through games and child-led activities. As per usual while on our journey we decided to take a “Colour Walk” which was to discover all the many colours Fall has to offer us and nature provided in abundance.
We also found 3 Red Backed Salamanders, discovered new land and invented a new breed of mammal – Egglets. Please ask your child about them, or even better ask them to show you!
This week we welcomed the rain, and while some of us may stay inside to stay dry, our students embraced the rain and discovered our soil ecosystem, which was full of life! We even learned a new song called Young and Wild – ask your child to sing it for you!
While some of our students started their day playing rain hockey/rain soccer, some were working on their powers that controlled the weather (wind), and discovered magical crowns, similar to what the fairies wear.
We then ventured to “hot chocolate mountain” and really began diving into the dirt, which brought extreme discoveries. Ranging from frogs, millipedes, HUGE worms, spiders, ant farms, magical willow monsters, and even a Red Spotted Newt! This was a great find for our students because it was new, and the second ever found on Bygone Days Property.
Along our adventure we even came across our pear tree, and we thought it was a great day to introduce our students into cooking over the fire, and we are so proud of the teamwork for stick collecting. We are continuing each week to work towards building our fire skills with our 3 D’s (Dead, Dry and Down) – which is even harder when it’s wet outside, but our sweet reward was worth the wait!
We love taking the time to sing, dance, get really muddy, explore and investigate even if it’s the roots of a plant! We love to give children the guidance and empowerment to try new things even if its letting a spider walk on their leg, and as one of our students said today, ” I’m scared of spiders but I’m trusting myself”.
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!
We are filled with gratitude for the wonderful welcome into the Wasaga Beach community from our new friends and families. Our day was filled with little moments that took us by surprise (literal surprise!.. aka spotted touch me not flowers), and big moments that brought us all together to build relationships.
We are very proud to say that all of our students have amazing Owl eyes (excellent vision) and identified plants and creatures that our teachers even missed. Our students were so eager to share their findings with their fellow peers and were constantly asking “I wonder” questions, which as educators we love as we want to keep those inquisitive minds pondering. We worked on mapping, tracking and our karate moves when we walked through unknown spider webs.
A lot of our students were new to this forested area, which made for lots of hiking and exploration. We were really looking to the ground for what Mother Nature had to offer and we were not disappointed. Some of the finding our student made were: Monarch Butterflies, Yellow Bears (Caterpillars), Huge Dragonflies, Inch worms, Tree Frogs, Fire Ants, Mushrooms, Ferns, Trees, oh and did we mention Millipedes? These friendly little fellas were abundant today showing us their legs, body and how they protect themselves. Our students were even lucky enough to have some firsts and felt what it was like to hold one. As one student said “it feels very ticklish and feels super cool”.
We want to thank you to all the students for coming into the Forest with us and exploring, wandering, playing and sharing their stories, we are very lucky to have spent our day with such awesome students.
Come back each week to see what we have been up to!
What an amazing day to welcome new and familiar faces back to Forest School, and our Chickadees didn’t waste anytime getting back into the swing of things. We had a busy morning filled with games, running, building, obstacle courses, a very talented band, and our returning students even helped with our morning fire!
Jumping into our core routines (opening circle, sit spots), our Chickadees were constantly practicing their Deer ears (excelling listening), Owl eyes (excellent vision) and Fox feet (being super sneaky). These skills were used while we found an abundance of small creatures only found by those who believe in the magic of the woods! Some of the smaller friends we found were Caterpillars, Spiders, Worms, Fire Ants, A Preying-mantis and Grass Hoppers (great job to all of those who caught one, and showing us that their pee stains your hands – But with a little hand sanitizer, cleaned right up!).
While bugs were the highlight of our day, mother nature provided moments for us to relax and learn about her other offerings, such as Plantain, Goldenrod and Walnut Seeds. Coming close to the end of our day we ended with an amazing and very skillful game of soccer.
We had a day full of laughing, adventure, exploring and first times, and we couldn’t have asked for a better group of chickadees to share our day with!
Thanks for stopping by,
Emily and Krista and the FNS Team.
Check out some pictures below to see how our day went!
Hey Folks! We’ve been busy playing outside. Here’s a recap of the last few weeks!
Paddling
We love exploring our extended backyard and our older students ventured off on a field trip to the Beaver River. We had some amazing weather systems – both warm and wet! – that challenged us along the way. We learned about water/river safety, paddling skills and most importantly had fun connecting with our classmates on the water. Our oldest students had the chance to do some kayaking as well!
Climbing
Speaking of our amazing “backyard”, we also headed out to Metcalfe Rock for our annual Rock Climbing trip with our older groups. Students pushed their limits and reached for the skies as they ascended this ancient rock!
Birds
Bygone days continues to be alive with Birds and we’ve been treated to watching many different species of birds build their nests, defend their territories and raise little babies. As we tune in more to Bird Language, our world is opening up!
Homemade Glue
It’s easier (and stickier) than you think! Some folks had the opportunity to make homemade pine pitch glue (pine resin, beeswax and ground up coals) over the fire. We used it to make some pretty rad arrows and spears!
“Spirit Bear” (aka Bear Bear, AKA Cuddles)
We’ve got a new addition to our crew that you may have heard of. Earlier this Spring we were given a special Bear to take on our journeys and to catch and listen to all our stories. This was passed on by a friend (thanks Lori!) after she received it from a Cree Elder for work she has done with Indigenous youth. Spirit Bear has had a huge impact for some of our students and has paddled the Beaver River, climbed at Metcalfe and followed us just about everywhere. Our students have even outfitted him in complete rain suits on the wetter days!
Reptiles, Amphibians and More!
There’s maybe nothing in the world that gets the kids more excited than heading out net in hand to capture some critters. We’ve seen it all this year, from damselfly nymphs and water scorpions, to frogs, toads and turtles. We’ve even observed/caught a few new-to-us species on our property – spring peepers, gray tree frogs and snapping turtles!
Wild Edibles
As the Spring rolls on, we encounter more and more delicious wonders of the Forest. Stay tuned parents – we’ve got a workshop coming up for you that will help you chow down alongside your nature kids!
And of course, there’s so much more, but too much to sum up in a simple little blog.
Hey Folks!
We’ve been busy enjoying the warmer temperatures and exciting changes that Spring brings! Here’s a few of the highlights over the past weeks.
Carving
Tool-use is a big part of FNS, and with the warmer temps, we are seeing an increased interested in creating wood projects. We love the creativity and the projects we see developing around the campfire during down time. With only a couple months until our Spring Trading Blanket (see here for more info), students are getting busy preparing!
Larping
When our Wednesday students approached us about creating a LARP (Live Action Role Play) we wanted to be supportive and follow their passions – but admittedly we had to look it all up first! A quick google search later on and we were totally on board with them. Over the course of a couple weeks, students developed characters, a whole fantasy world, shelters and stores and mapped the entire area of Mysterious Forest (which became “Indigoweeodd”, a last remaining settlement in a post-apocalyptic world). They developed complex social orders, a monetary system known as wood chips and a whackload of rules and guidelines around play, battle, trading and magic. And while I can’t do it justice in a blog, it was an epic day of uncovering treasure, friendship (and treason!) and solving the clues. And to our pleasant surprise, it ended in a peace treaty signed by all! No doubt if your child was part of this, you’ve heard the stories and know by their excitement just how awesome this day was and why it will go down in Forest School History for us.
BirdinG
Some of our students are taking advantage of the return of the birds and really getting to understand and know them. They are successfully identifying most common species,as well as other not as common ones. As we tap into the bird language, we are learning a lot about what is going on all around all day and gaining a deeper connection with the land.
Geocacheing
Easter hunt… FNS style. We learned how to use a GPS to uncover a treat (Marshmallows) to cook over the fire!
Sowing Seeds
We are getting our gardens ready, making planters and planting seeds!
Wild Edibles
Perhaps one of our favourite times of year is when we start seeing old friends popping up. Our leek colonies are out in full force as we focused this week on sustainable harvesting. Trout lilies make a delicious treat along our hikes and we’ve even sampled some wild carrots (Queen Anne’s Lace)! It’s a tasty time of year.
Catchable Critters
We’ve seen a significant jump in the amount of reptile and amphibian friends over the past little while. So much so that we rarely venture without a net in hand. As the student are getting up close and personal with these folks, they are making respectful and lasting connections with them and uncovering first hand new ideas – including that turtles aren’t as slow and they are made out to be!
April Showers
We’ve had a lot of rain this past while are a so thankful for it! We try and shift perspectives of rainy days and “bad days” at FNS in a effort to minimize the idea that happiness, exploration and fun are contingent on the sun. Some of our favourite days so far have left us soaked! The plants and animals are loving the water and it gives us new, more adventurous routes along our hikes. Levels are up all over the place, with the river higher than we’ve ever seen and some sit spots being totally washed out. We love that with repetitive exposure to the same spots, students get the chance to observe and notice these changes on a weekly basis.
Music
Most groups have gravitated toward really musical days! We’ve got our established weekly songs, and are writing many more together with the classes. Students are even writing and playing their very own using a ukulele!
And there is so much more that I just can’t sum up here! Have a great weekend.
