Forest School: Expanding the Horizon

Our highly anticipated fourth forest school excursion continued the trend of setting the bar a little bit higher. Instead of our usual brief walk to Cliveden, we managed an impressive one mile trek to Awbury Arboretum. In addition to boosting our stamina, this new location offered many delights: a pile of humongous tree trunks to climb on, leaf piles worthy of jumping in, a feeling of being genuinely encircled by forest, a shark, and some other new species of plants and insects to inspect. Activities included some old favorites such as collecting leaves, making bows, and building fairy-sized structures, as well as some new ones such as turning a huge log into a seesaw, creating a jumping pit from found materials, and calculating the age of seriously old trees by counting their rings. Our beautiful new forest school blanket also made its debut, providing the perfect setting for yet another picnic lunch. After lunch it was time to get an early start on our sizable journey back to school, but not before another run-through of the practice of "leave no trace."

The growth among the children is becoming more and more obvious. I personally had the opportunity to witness children walk much farther than they knew they could. I watched them work up the courage to successfully climb up and over obstacles that were at first daunting. I saw them give a level of attention and an eye for detail to their environment that most classroom teachers could only dream of. I noticed friendships strengthening and pockets of collaboration forming where they have not existed before. I observed children organically create projects for themselves and carry them through to completion without the need of adult involvement. I perceived children who are loving learning.