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Ever wondered what that stuff is that looks like bits of spittle on vegetation at this time of year? Often called cuckoo spit it is in fact caused by the tiny larvae of the froghopper, known as the spittle bug.

Inside here is a larvae of the froghopper, overwise known as the spittlebug. The larvae is a tiny green bug that pierces the stem of the plant and sucks the sap, secreting lots of bubbles from its anus to wrap itself in a protective bubbly blob. This helps to hide it away from predators, regulate temperature and keep it moist.

Adult froghoppers come in a variety of colours and patterns. Their wings are held over their bodies in a tent like shape and to escape predators in a hurry they can jump up to 70cm high!

EXCITING NEWS!!!! We are delighted to be a recipient of Tesco’s #BagsofHelp initiative. We have been chosen to receive a grant to assist Warrington schools to get children out into nature. How much funding we get depends on public vote so PLEASE please visit your local store and help make a difference in your community. Tesco has teamed up with Groundwork to launch its Bags of Help initiative in hundreds of regions across England and Wales. The scheme will see three community groups and projects in each region awarded grants of £12,000, £10,000 and £8,000 – all raised from the 5p bag charge.

Bags of Help offers community groups and projects in each of Tesco’s 390 regions across the UK a share of revenue generated from the five pence charge levied on single-use carrier bags.

The public will now vote in store from 27 February until 6 March on who should receive the £12,000, £10,000 and £8,000 awards.

We will be using one of these awards to fund projects in schools across Warrington, by getting the children involved in designing and building their own schools outdoor space, creating natural outdoor learning environments like planting trees, installing willow tunnels, raised beds, butterfly gardens and wild spaces. How many schools and pupils we can help will depend on how many votes we get, so please vote for us in your local Tesco store.

Lets get Warrington kids outside and into nature!

Please visit your local store and help make a difference in your community.

To find out more about the #BagsofHelp initiative visit www.tesco.com/bagsofhelp

Tesco customers are voting on how 1000 community groups will share £11.5 million from the 5p bag charge #BagsOfHelphttps://t.co/mKPkSFUHY3

— Tesco News (@tesconews) February 27, 2016

A marvellous first day at our forest school summer holiday club.

Day one of…Den in the Woods and what an adventure we had 🙂

We made dens, played games, did lots of crafts using wool, sticks, clay and paracord. Went on a lost city adventure walk, looked at minibeasts, counted butterflies. Read stories, rescued soft woodland toy animals, sheltered from a thunder storm, toasted marshmallows and used some tools to whittle and make mallets. 🙂
Looking forward to more adventures tomorrow. We still have some places, you can book through our website, email or give us a call Mark 07504675551 or Sally 07954160118.

 

We’ve been playing a variant of a manhunt game quite a lot at Chaigeley School recently which we call Jailbreak.  This week we have been developing the rules to make the game more dynamic, and have come up with a really good game with a competitive edge.

Previous to this week we have been playing a simple jailbreak game where I usually play the role of the ‘jailer’ where I have to tag a player and lead him or her back to a designated jail where they have to stay unless they are released by a free player (by tagging them and shouting “1,2,3 X is released from jail”).  The problem was that sometimes the person in jail wasn’t released because the free players just would hide, and I would tend to stay too near to the jail in the hope of catching players attempting to free prisoners.  We needed to adapt the rules to make the game more interesting.

So now we have another member of staff who is the ‘holder of the treasure’.  Their role is to wander through the woods with some treasure.  This could be anything – tokens, coins, tickets etc.  (We used 2″ lengths of paracord.)  Each player can claim a bit of treasure once per minute.  They can also get 5 pieces of treasure for releasing a prisoner.  This makes me as the jailer have to move around more so I have to seek players, attempt to prevent treasure collection and to guard the jail at the same time. The players are encouraged to come out of hiding to claim treasure and are rewarded for breaking others out of jail.  The winner is the player who at the end of the game has the most treasure.  This could be exchanged for rewards at the end if appropriate.

The game we played last week was a lot of fun and it was great to hear the laughter as the game was played, especially as I was sneaking up to where a couple of players were talking and got to within just a few yards before being spotted, followed by a shout of surprise and flight and pursuit through the woods.  Great fun!

In this setting the balance of play is usually me as the jailer and about 5 players.  It could be developed for more players by having a similar ratio of jailers to players, for example 2 jailers for 12 players or something.  Have a play about with it and see how it goes with larger groups.  I would tend to have faster runners as jailers so they have a chance to catch some prisoners.

EDIT:  We had a new rule suggested and tried last week:  A prisoner may buy their way out of jail for the cost of 3 tokens.  –  Worked really well, giving everyone the chance go get out quickly if they wish, but at a small cost.

One of my favourite Forest School activities is what I call the woodland hunt.  I hide a load of soft toys of fauna that may be found in a woodland habitat, putting them where they are most likely to be.  You know, squirrels in the trees, millipedes under branches on the floor, butterflies at the flowers etc.  I invite the children to go and find them and off they go on a wonderful hunt through the woods looking for my little friends.  Now they are using their eyes and starting to really take in what is around them, they are looking at details and seeing things in the woodland environment, but not necessarily processing all that they see because they are focused on finding the toy animals I have hidden.  They find them and bring them back to me to tell me about what they have found.

By chance and circumstance I have been doing an experiment this week into the range of pupils this activity can be used for.  I have done this activity with 2 and 3 year olds in a parent and toddler group.  I have used it with a group of 7-9 year olds in a primary school, with some reception classes (5 year olds) and with a group of 9 year olds with autism.  I would also like to see how well it would work with secondary but don’t have a group of that age to work with at the moment.  

Well the response from all client groups has been brilliant.  With the youngest we can just keep it as a fun activity where we are basically playing hide and seek with the animals, me hiding them for them, the children hiding them for me to find, and having lots of fun in the process.  The children are using their senses, solving problems, thinking about the point of view of others and considering the creatures preferred places to be.  Now I have a fantastic chance to get them to think about so many things; where did you find your animal? what was it doing? was it happy there? tell me about your animal.  what type of creature is it?  how many legs? wings? etc.  Now we are starting to think about habitats, the needs of creatures to survive, adaptations to their environment, predator / prey relationships, food chains and webs, simply loads of the science curriculum can be addressed from here and there is huge scope for differentiation.  This activity is then turned onto the children by giving them the task of building a house / den / shelter for their animals.  Off they go now and get creative, using materials they can find to create something for their animals.  They really get stuck in and are solving problems, learning about forces and structure, considering the needs of their animal and having fun of course.

With the older ones we are bringing in aspects of the national curriculum such as Science – Living things and their habitats, Forces, Design and Technology – construction and evaluation, Personal Social and Emotional development as they work together and negotiate, and spoken English.  I have found that the children engage themselves in the activity brilliantly and use lots of imagination and creativity, and their play goes on to develop into other areas – some go off and build full size dens, some want to go and hunt for real creatures (always have some minibeast hunt resources available), and some build mini towns and cities for their toy animals to live in complete with transport systems, neibourhoods and roleplay.  The great thing for me is that the children differentiate for themselves, going off on tangents and following their interests or developing intricate detail in what they are doing.

This type of activity can be revisited multiple times because there is always something new to learn or a new situation to role play, or a different creature to provide for or just something which if fun to do.  Children like to be able to repeat activities which have been beneficial to them and always seem to get something more out of it.

I’ve been posting the photos of what the children have been creating on Facebook so that parents can share what their children have been doing during forest school and that the children can see that their efforts are valued, and that even though next time they come to the woods their den may not still be there, it has been recorded and still exists in digital form.

Look closely and you will see how the children have been highly creative in their constructions.  They have built using various methods and with different reasoning and for different purposes.  They have solved problems both in their imagination and physically in making their constructions stand up.

This morning Mrs. T’s class came to forest school for their first time.  They were great, really embracing it and despite the rain had a great time.  We did some teamwork games, made friendship bracelets and went on a journey to discover the little people who live in the woods. 

Some of them decided how to repair the accidental damage that had been wrought to the little peoples village by sneezy the dragon and set to work.  Other children constructed full size dens using materials they could find in the woods, and later used tarpaulins to provide shelter from the train.

We all finished up with toasted marshmallows and a single word review.

Later, in the rain, the toddler group really liked the little peoples village, particularly the dragons den and they set about making improvements, creating a garden for the dragon.  They also really enjoyed the puddles, splashing, jumping and even sitting in them. 

The sausages we grilled over the fire really helped to keep us warm, and the children liked to feel the radiated heat of the fire on their hands.

After school we practiced making bumblebees from alder cones and yellow wool, built dens, climbed trees, cooked sausages and toasted marshmallows.
Another great day in forest school at St. Wilfrid’s.

We had great fun in the after school club today. The children were really enthusiastic which is always so nice to see.
They all got to use the bow saw and the hand drill and learned how to tie a reef knot as they made their name tags.
There was some fantastic tree climbing and playing on the low ropes course as week as den building and digging.
Looking forward to next week.

There are still some places available in the after school clubs, contact us or the school if you want to book a place.
07504 675551