The children of Beech Class helped to give our Forest School site a bit of a spring tidy today. The first thing they did was to remove all the old burnt wood and ashes that were left behind in the fire circle. They used spades to dig out the ashes and bag them up ready for use in another project.
They then moved on to creating a dead hedge in the pond area. They first helped to gather all the materials needed for this task, including hazel poles for stakes and any tree branches and other natural materials they could find. Using a pruning saw the children took it in turns to cut the hazel poles in half, while one was cutting the others helped to hold the pole still. They were then able to use wooded mallets to drive the stakes into the ground.
With the stakes in place the children started to lay the gathered branches inside the stakes, piling it higher and pushing it down before adding more.
Other children chose to explore the whole school grounds on a hunt for some very early signs of spring. They used a sheet to help them, marking off what they spotted as they went. We were joined at Forest School by a selection of bird teddies, the children had a go at building their own bird nests for these birds to sit in and filled them with stones they had decorated to be eggs.
