Farewell to the Outdoor Play Party.

 

Sadly this is the last Outdoor Play Party, after a few years co-hosting this link up of outdoor play posts from bloggers around the world, it is time to call it quits. I first joined in with the original co-hosts Mama Peapod and Greening Sam & Avery. As their lives got busier they had to leave the party but it kept going with The Golden Gleam and Kitchen Counter Chronicles (KCC) and myself. We have had some other bloggers join in for a time - Flights of Whimsy, Happy Hooligans, Making Boys Men & The Usual Mayhem. More recently it has been Rain or Shine Mamma, Mud Mud Marvellous Mud and Adventure Togs with myself and KCC. But alas all good things have to come to an end, we are all busier and moving in different directions and finding the fortnightly link up party too hard to maintain. I will continue to blog about getting outdoors & some of the adventures of my nursery class & I hope that all those who have supported the Outdoor Play Party and my blog in particular will continue to interact with me on any posts, I always look forward to getting comments on my posts.

So this week we had our second visit to the Wild Woods at An Creagán, I am a big advocate of allowing children to revisit familiar sites and to allow them to have time to explore freely and enjoy trying skills over and over.
For this visit, I could allow the children to run on ahead on the path until they found the gate, I loved that those who got there first just sat down at the gate waiting for the rest to catch up! Peter, the bio-diversity officer had lit the fire so at the gate, I explained they couldn't run on ahead but had to walk with an adult in front because of the fire. Because we have a fire weekly in school these children are used to being around a fire and they knew to walk round the fire to get a seat. 

The fire circle where we sometimes have lunch.

They had been talking about what they were going to do since their last visit - catching a newt was top of some lists, climbing up the steepest bank on another & enjoying tea at the fairy tea party topped a lot of lists!
After listening to Peter talk about how he was going to make them some charcoal, the children had a request for him - they wanted to have lunch in 'the straw house' - a Bronze Age Hut recently built in an authentic village within the larger site. After hearing they could have lunch in there they were free to go and play.

The tree house, the children can really feel as if they are inside a tree!

It is a wonderful site where the children can really feel they are out of sight when really they are visible to all the adults. I love that they can spread themselves all over the site, they will be pond dipping, climbing the banks, playing in the tree house, having tea at the fairy tea party, cooking in the kitchen, digging or playing with water in the barrel. And even with all that is on offer there is also the option to just sit on a rock and watch the world go by. 

A table with beautiful china set up for the children to enjoy.

We allow the children to just be, there is no end result of our visit other than that they have fun and enjoy themselves. It is always so wonderful to see a quiet, timid child having so much fun just gathering stones in a bucket or sliding down a muddy bank. 
We usually have just over an hour to enjoy just playing before I blow the whistle 3 times to signal it is time to go back to the seating area.

'The straw house' where we had a lunch.

This time rather than have lunch around the fire we walked back to the entrance and had it in the Bronze Age Village in the 'straw house'. The children loved this experience - as far as they were concerned it was a much better version than the one the little pig made! This village has been built using traditional materials and methods and the hut is a real work of art - the walls are woven willow and were just starting to sprout leaves.
After lunch the children had a play in the play park before heading back to nursery on the bus.We had lot of tired, wet and muddy children but thankfully most parents are always delighted to see the muddy faces as a true sign of a really fun filled day.

A massive thanks to all of those who linked up to the Outdoor Play Party last time, I hope you will all grab the 'featured at' badge and continue to keep on promoting great outdoor play in your blogs.

Outdoor Play Party - Outdoor Art - Part 2.

The finished sea scape and beach scene!

Over the past few months the nursery class has created lots of outdoor art, mostly for Bear Woods, our little wooded/wild area above the nursery.

In February thanks to funding from the Integrated Education Fund, we were able to work with our partner school, Sperrinview and professional artist, Grainne Kielty,  to create clay footprints for the fence up in Bear Woods.

All 40 children involved in the project made a print of their welly boot or shoe in clay and then after they were painted and glazed our caretaker was good enough to display them along the fence.

Then I also applied for funding from The Play Resource in Belfast to allow the children to work with another professional artist, Fionnuala Duffin. I sent her some photos of the fence up in Bear Woods and Fionnuala came up with a greta idea to help decorate the fence with some weaving. However, not just any old weaving the children created a beach scene over 3 days by weaving strips of different coloured and textured materials into the fence.

They also made some jelly fish from recycled plastic containers and fish from old CDs. These were tied along the fence and placed between the plastic sections of the fence in the 'sea'!
They also made a big octopus and snail to go live outdoors in this space too.

I think it has really brightened up the space and allowed the children to see how they can use existing things like the fence to create art work. 

My favourite post from the last link up was by Small Wonders on their outdoor kitchen - sometimes simple really is best & the photos in this post perfectly illustrate how children don't need a lot fancy resources to have a fun time outdoors.

"Now it’s time for this week’s Outdoor Play Party. We would appreciate it if you included a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play! In return, we’ll gladly further share your post on Pinterest. Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back. Please note that by contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished if featured.(If you have been featured, please feel free to grab the ‘featured at’ button from the sidebar.) Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week!"

An InLinkz Link-up

Outdoor Play Party - Guest Post from Growing Inch By Inch.

For the latest Outdoor Play Party I am delighted to welcome Jessica Lewis Owner & Lead Teacher at Growing Inch by Inch Preschool in Maine. Jessica and I have been friends through social media for a couple of years now and I love watching the adventures her charges get up to in all weathers.Here Jessica celebrates the start of Spring after a long, long snowy Winter!

I could take a million pictures and videos of the children playing in their rain suits.  

I could watch them all day long.   

To me, those suits represent the feeling of freedom. 

Free from the snow and the long winter! 

Free to be wild and messy! 

Free to discover and explore! 

Something about those rain suits gives the children the freedom to be children!  Free to laugh and have fun! 

And that is something I could watch forever! 

My favourite post from the last link up was from a lovely new blog to me: Hen Family: I loved this post about how to enjoy being outdoors all year round; Getting Outside in All Seasons.

"Now it’s time for this week’s Outdoor Play Party. We would appreciate it if you included a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play! In return, we’ll gladly further share your post on Pinterest. Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back. Please note that by contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished if featured.(If you have been featured, please feel free to grab the ‘featured at’ button from the sidebar.) Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week!"

An InLinkz Link-up

Outdoor Play Party - enhancing a play space.

 I recently had time to reflect on how our playground had evolved over the past 9 years and whilst it is true we have added lots of new 'stuff' to the space, none of it has cost any money. The initial outlay of costs had happened before we moved into the new school - with the safety surface, tarmac, grass and fixed equipment. Then for the past 9 years as we have added to the space it has been donations of logs or tree stumps, bark chips or grass cuttings. We are all in 'finder' mode all the time, so when one assistant visited her mother who was gathering up all the leaves and beechnuts in her garden, she knew these would be perfect to add to our forest area.

The Bottle Babies enhance play in so many ways & are essentially free, especially if you can persuade parents to gather them up for you & then you just fill me with things you have lying around anyway - old pen lids, straws, sequins or glitter etc.
The mud kitchen which is our biggest fixed asset added in the last year was kindly built for us by a friend and a very willing parent who provided all the materials. As I said in the last Outdoor Play Party, this element has created a whole new layer to the play outdoors, as the children enjoy cooking and preparing so many meals for us and each other on a daily basis.

In third term we introduce the big compost bins as another resource for the children to incorporate into their play.

The biggest message I would like to get across to all those who are developing their outdoor space is to try and create as much as you can for as little as possible. We all know the term 'loose parts' now and it is these movable pieces that provide the best resources to enhance play. If they haven't cost a lot of money then you will be less inclined to worry about the children moving them around or incorporating them into various play scenarios.

From the last link up my favourite post was from Cuddles & Muddles on the simple joy of running. There is nothing as joyous for young children as having the freedom to just run up or down even the slightest incline.

"Now it’s time for this week’s Outdoor Play Party. We would appreciate it if you included a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play! In return, we’ll gladly further share your post on Pinterest. Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back. Please note that by contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished if featured.(If you have been featured, please feel free to grab the ‘featured at’ button from the sidebar.) Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week!"

An InLinkz Link-up

Outdoor Play Party - the mud kitchen is a year old!

 It is hard to believe it but our amazing mud kitchen is a year old, it is actually quite difficult to imagine play without it as it is such an integral part of our outdoor time now.
You can read abut how we got to have such an incredible resource over here.

It is lovely how much the children have made it theirs over the past year and have added little additions like a muddy puddle in one corner & also how they continually make new discoveries about the space every day. 

This week 3 children were delighted to find out they could make marks and handprints on the back of the mud kitchen using water.

We were lucky to have the dad of one of our assistants add a little water station as well so the children have somewhere to store all the precious water from the rain barrel when the carry it over to the mud kitchen.

The most important development in the past year is that the Principal of the school saw the value and breadth of play going on in the mud kitchen in nursery and applied for funding to have one built for the Foundation Stage children (4-6 year olds) by one of our amazing caretakers, who also happens to be a master carpenter.

Some days it is just lovely to sit back in the 'forest area' and listen to the chatter of the children as they play beyond the willow entrance into the mud kitchen.

My favourite post from the last Outdoor Play Party was from Rubber Boots and Elf Shoes in a fab post all about finding numbers in their natural environment.
I love to see teachers of older children taking their classes outdoors and some of the numbers created by the children are incredible.

"Now it’s time for this week’s Outdoor Play Party. We would appreciate it if you included a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play! In return, we’ll gladly further share your post on Pinterest. Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back. Please note that by contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished if featured.(If you have been featured, please feel free to grab the ‘featured at’ button from the sidebar.) Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week!"

An InLinkz Link-up

Outdoor Play Party - an eBook on outdoor provision.

For the latest Outdoor Play Party I am delighted to share a new eBook that I have helped collaborate on with 11 other early years folks from around the UK.

I have no doubt that Twitter has provided me with some of the best Continued Professional Development (CPD) in the best few years, as I have connected with fellow early years enthusiasts around the globe. I was very impressed with an early eBook some of the #eyfstwitterpals (eyfs stands for early years foundation stage) had produced last year showing a month of activities in their settings.

So when Geoff Billing asked if anyone wanted to contribute to another eBook on outdoor provision, I jumped at the chance!

Each of us had to submit 10 posts on any topic of our choosing that we felt would help to inspire others as they develop their outdoor areas. I love that so many of the posts are about every day materials like tyres, sticks, tarpaulins, water & sticks.

I hope that people download the eBook & dip in & of it as they explore how best to enhance their outdoor play experiences, whether in a formal setting or just at home. Please follow this link to download it: http://goo.gl/oLVPYN

Please make sure you follow each of the contributors on Twitter so you can keep up with all the great stuff that they continually share.

I don't know about anyone else in this part of the world but I am so ready for Spring & dry, warmer weather! So the post that appealed to me most in the last link up was from Cuddles & Muddles all about how they enjoyed a very simple day in their own back garden in some lovely spring weather.

"Now it’s time for this week’s Outdoor Play Party. We would appreciate it if you included a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play! In return, we’ll gladly further share your post on Pinterest. Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back. Please note that by contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished if featured.(If you have been featured, please feel free to grab the ‘featured at’ button from the sidebar.) Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week!"

An InLinkz Link-up