Forest School and Farm Trips

Theme

Activities which can be included                                                                   

(not all can happen in one session, they will be tweaked for the age group)

Woodland Habitats

Seasonal nature walk, identify plants and animals using magnifying glasses and ID keys to match up footprints and so forth, build habitats for a woodland soft toy animal

Explore age appropriate science language, e.g. adaptation, food webs and chains

Classification/ Identification of either  trees, flowers/plants, food chains/webs

Minibeasts: Minibeast hunting using magnifying glasses and collection pots, explore using ID keys to identify them, observational drawings using charcoal

Trees, Glorious Trees: transient art from collected natural materials, leaf hammering, tree identification and classification activity

Grassland / Wild flower habitats: transient art, nature walk, identification and classification challenges, explore structure of a plant

Food chains: explore owl pellets with tweezers and identification sheets, large scale fabric food chains with sticks and a basket of props and words to sort

Lambing           

6-21st March 2025

Learn about lambing time on a farm, walk around farmyard, seeing the lambs with their mothers and discover the work a farmer has to do, if there is a cade lamb (without a mother), help bottle feed it, craft activity with sheep’s wool, tractor and trailer ride (weather dependent)

Children can spend a day surviving in the woods during the Stone Age!

Children will learn what is needed to survive.  They will be able to whittle a stick using flints and make bread dough, which they will then cook over the fire using the stick they had whittled.  Children will be able to try using a genuine Quern grinding stone to grind wheat to make their own flour, which was discovered in a quarry and dates back to the Stone Age.

To extend to a full day, children can head to a different base camp using waymarkers along the way, where they can spend the afternoon building shelters in small tribes and have a go at making a wattle and daub wall.

Sounds

Make a musical instrument from natural materials, join together to make a band, distance games, explore sounds on trees                                                                                                               

Find a magic spot, listen to the sounds and draw the origin of the sound on a paper plate, on the side the sound is coming from.  

Shelter Building

Discuss what is needed to survive outside, considering hierarchy of survival needs.  In teams build a shelter using a tarpaulin and natural materials.  The session will be concluded by each group presenting their shelter to the rest of the group and they will be scored for their level of robustness, protection from the elements and team working skills.

Creativity Outdoors            

- Clay                       

- Charcoal 

- Potential of a stick   

- Watercolour painting

Clay: Storytelling through the use of creating clay creatures or decorations, children will begin by planning a story board in small groups, before creating their characters and then renacting the story to finish.

Charcoal: Make our own charcoal by whittling bark off willow sticks.  Sticks are then placed in a tin over a fire, when done, children can use the charcoal to make a special drawing.  Children learn how to use a knife and build a fire, following our safety rules.

Potential of a stick: Encourage children to come out with their own ideas in how they could use a stick.  Following activities available - mark making with sticks with mud, make streamers on sticks, build a human body out of sticks, tools can be available to support with whittling

Watercolour painting of a farm landscape

Fairies and Goblins

Tell a story about the fairies and goblins living in the woods and how the fat bottomed dragon came and squashed their village, how could we help?  Encourage children to design and make gifts to leave for them and share them with the group at the end.

Food to Fork Outdoor Cooking                  

- Healthy Diet              

- Seasonality          

- Techniques                

- Little Red Hen  

- Crops/Harvest

Build a fire following our fire safety rules and cook from a range of items:                                    

- Wild foraging and make nettle soup (Spring/early summer)                                                         

 - Blackberry pancakes (September)                                                                                            

- Doughnuts   

- Baking bread

Little Red Hen: Bring the story to life on Forest School, puppets available to support reinacting the story, children can individually make their own bread dough and bake over a fire on a stick to make a bread cup

Crops: Tractor and trailer ride around the farm (as long as good ground conditions) to explore the farming calendar with the varying processes from drilling the seed to combining the crops.  Look closely at the roots and different parts of the plants.  On return to the farmyard, grind corn to make flour and finish with a plan a farm craft activity (varied for different ages).

Tools

- Bows and arrows                      

- Whittling                 

- Catapults             

- Wood Cookies     

- Games

Bows and arrows: Use knives and loppers to create bows and arrows, children can work together to make a target area

Whittling:  Can be used for range of purposes to whittle a stick to make a spoon, toast a marshmallow, artwork

Catapults: learn how to use tools to create catapults

Wood cookies: use bow saws or loppers to make a key ring, coaster or for noughts and crosses, charcoal available for mark making

Games: children can design their own games

Compass and Map Reading

Route of the Navigator: learn how to read a compass and map before heading off in small groups to follow a route, being guided by clues on a sheet and a compass and map.  Add features discovered onto the map along the way

Competitive games

Outdoor adventurous challenges/team building games

Capture the flag game where children are in two teams, the build their den and flag first, decide upon their team tactics ready for the game to begin - which team will capture the other teams flag first - encourage children to reflect and decide rules

Other games can include:                                                                                                             

- Create shapes in rope, which team will create different shapes first without everyone not letting go of the place on the rope                                                                                                 

- Bat and Moth game, exploring echo location in a fun way

Bespoke maths

We can create a bespoke maths session, (for an additional £1 per child).  These sessions can help children make accelerated progress through outdoor learning, a captivating learning environment.

Examples could include fractions using natural materials, transient art symmetry, 2D.3D shapes created using sticks and tying with string