Avalon were exploring the River Ayr area for their John Muir Day yesterday. We started off by discussing the good things about the area and things that could be improved. The children liked that there were benches to sit on and some great trees that they could climb. We spotted a heron in the water and even saw a man trying to catch some fish!

The children felt that there could be more bins in the area for people to put their rubbish in and that there could be some tables for people to stop and enjoy a picnic as it is such a beautiful place.

We had great fun exploring the area! We found lots of different types of leaves, some wild mushrooms and even some slugs. We made some casts of leaves and other natural objects that we found and worked together in small groups to make boats from natural objects which we set sail on the river.

It was a fantastic day!

Marneil went to explore the area around the Monument. We had some great discussions about why this area is important and well looked after.

Some people found it quite a challenging walk to the monument and noticed that some of the steps were broken on the way up. A few members of our group think that it would be a good idea to have some bins installed at the top to ensure that people can bin their litter.

We walked from the monument along to the woods and collected lots of natural materials to make our very own natural material mobiles. We spent a bit of time sheltered in the woods creating these before walking back to the school.

Have a look at some of our wonderful creations.

We went to explore the Voes for our John Muir day and discussed what we liked and what we could improve.

Here are some things we liked:

I like the leaves and all the tall plants. It’s really calm. Harper

I like when the ducks quack.  Jenna

I like nature, it’s nice and calming. – Kacey

Here are some things we would like to improve:

We could have more benches.

We could put posters up to encourage people to pick up dog mess.

There could be some bins.

We then made made natural paintbrushes using sticks and leaves and experimented using these to make colourful pictures.

This morning we went a walk down to the Games Hall to investigate the area and complete a nature mandala activity.  We first looked around and discussed what we thought:

What we like about the area…

”You can pick brambles” Lucie & Myia

”I like the trees” Daryl

”We can run about and play basketball and football” Ivy

”I like the colours of the trees” Ellie

“the mad fab” Cole

What can we do to make it better…

”keep it clean” Poppy

”stop littering” Millie & Savannah

We then collected treasure to take back to school to make nature mandalas. Look at the wonderful patterns…

We then enjoyed some mindfulness colouring of mandalas…