Easter Traditions - indoors & out!

When I came to teach in my current school I inherited an annual Easter Egg Hunt fund raising event from my predecessor. For a few years we used any funds raised within the nursery class but when we moved to our new building with brilliant new resources, we decided to make it an event for fund raising for charity. For the past few years our chosen charity has been Marie Curie Cancer Care and we have also had an outdoor egg hunt too. It has usually been in Peatlands Park but this year we decided to have it in Bear Woods.

When the children arrived at the gate to Bear Woods they noticed a letter hanging on the gate, it was addressed to 'Windmill Nursery' and much to their excitement it was a letter from the Easter bunny to say they had left 10 clues within Bear Woods for the children to find & then they would find some 'treasure'. 

The way we organise the hunt, is that I chose a spot to sit in & the children head off throughout the space to search for 10 paper eggs. Some were hidden beside logs or stumps, in a passel of Bottle Babies or in the long grass at the bottom of the trees. One of the adults always has 2-3 eggs in their pocket so if they see a child becoming very distressed about not finding one, they can drop one nearby for them to find. As they find the eggs they bring back to me & we count them until we have 9. Then I let them run about for one more look to see if they can find the last egg before I announce that I will get up & help them look for it - of course when I get up & turn round the last egg is found to have been stuck to me all along!!

Once all 10 eggs have been found there is usually a map to show them where the treasure is but time the bunny had written on the last egg that the treasure was hidden at the bottom of my rucksack. 
Each child got a chocolate chick to enjoy with their snack up in Bear Woods before they rolled their painted boiled eggs down the hill. 

Then the next day we had an indoor hunt, this time all the chocolate eggs are hidden around the classroom for the children to find & once again bring back to a central point & put into special Easter egg baskets. Every child had decorated a pot for the eggs to go into & they all got the same amount of chocolate eggs to take home.

Best of all we raised £156 for Marie Curie Cancer Care.