Den Building in Bear Woods.

I have managed to gather up some pallets over the years and it is now a given that any arrive at the school are offered to the nursery before being disposed of!  Last term I managed to make a little den in the playground form 4 pallets and the children use this on a regular basis during the play - it varies between being a stage, a bus or a house.

This year, the class has been struggling with using Bear Woods - they just don't seem to 'get' it - in other years we have had to take very little with us, resource wise, the class have always just played in the space and instinctively invented games just for this space. This year, this particular class are just content to play in the playground, they don't relish the idea of leaving it and believe me they use every inch of space during their play.
At the beginning of the new term we decided to add some new resources to the area to see if it would help enhance the play, we brought 4 pallets up and built a very rough mud kitchen, added a red top to gather water, some sauce pans and utensils & then left 3 pallets to make a den.

Today was he first time since September that I saw the class really play in the space, some sent the whole time making grass soups & stews and we realised that we need some more 'ingredients' for the mud kitchen e.g. bark chips or stones etc. whilst others helped me build a simple den with the pallets and then they added a roof with some of the Christmas tree branches. It was lovely to see them make a pretend fire and have hot chocolate in their new house.

Finally after 3 months I think we might be getting somewhere with this class and they may have begun to realise the potential of Bear Woods!