Category: Environmental Studies

Teamwork with Stornoway Primary P7

On Friday 1st November 2024, Tim and Fraser worked with the young people from Stornoway Primary P7. The activities were based in the Castle Grounds. The focus was teamwork.
Fraser’s activity was to design a shelter in the woods. The young people in groups of six to eight were tasked to build a shelter they could spend the night in. There was discussion about if this was an fun prospect, for some young people they were not definitely not excited by it.

 

The group were able to choose different sized tarpaulins, ropes, and to use natural resources. They were given thirty minutes to selected a suitable site in the woods, design their shelter, collect resources, and erect their home from home. All the teams were able to construct a shelter, some with a little more success than others.

After the thirty minutes, a team ‘spokesperson’ evaluated their shelter to the other teams. They talked about why their team selected the area, what resources they used and why, and what they would do differently next time.

The activity could be replicated in any school grounds and the equipment can be borrowed from the Outdoor Learning Team.

On possibility is the activity could be used to create opportunity to discuss the challenges of refugees and how people could become refugees. This progression has been used by one school with a lesson in a shelter leading to a discussion on how this made them feel.

The first part of Tim’s activities was for sub-groups to use a set of ‘skis’. These are planks with ropes which the  young people use to cross an area where they are not allowed to touch the ground with anything other than the skis. There were varying degrees of success leading to discussion of what successful team work might look like and different method of achieving success.

 

The equipment for these types of exercises can be borrowed from the Outdoor Team with briefing instructions and support if you would like it.

The second part of Tim’s activity was each sub-group was given a large sheet of paper on the ground and they had to create an art work, to create  window, or a picture with a deliberately vague brief to encourage creativity and discussion. The pictures were beautiful.

The resources needed for this were a sheet of paper and the young people’s imagination. They co-created transient art which in this case was connected to the environment and in some cases grew out of the environment. The activity could be used to create opportunities for discussions around sustainability.

Planting Beetroot with Small People

Beetroot is easy enough to grow in the garden, and it’s a solid favourite of ours! Your 5-a-day are important, beetroot is tasty and good for you. You can use it in soups, cakes, roast them or put them in salads. I personally like to stick some beetroot on a lollipop stick and eat it like a lollipop. 

They’re great veg to grow with kids because the seeds are quite big and so it’s not too fiddly for little hands. They grow best in slightly sandy earth, but they do well in any type of soil. For example, if your soil is a little too acidic, a little lime through it should balance it out. Beets grow best when there aren’t other plants right next to them so make sure it has a little room around it to grow. You don’t even need to plant beetroot in a plot, they’ll grow well in a tub or container of some sort!

If you want the young people you’re helping in the garden to be encouraged, beetroot is a good choice of vegetable for this. It’s easy enough to plant, and it grows easily a lot of the time. There is usually a little bit of time before you start to see it breaking through, but don’t worry as it will still be growing. They take a bit of time to germinate, even if you can’t see them. 

We used egg-boxes to start them off in. We chose these so that we could plant them into the ground if we wanted to, however if you don’t have the space to be able to plant them in the ground a reasonably sized container will do. Firstly we put some earth in each little section of the boxes. Little hands will certainly help with this!

As you can see here, beetroot seeds are big enough that little hands won’t have a problem picking them up here. You need one seed per egg divot. Put the seeds in the middle and press it down into the soil, before covering it with more soil. Your helper will be able to do this without a problem!

Your beets should germinate within 14 days, and you  might start to see, at the earliest, sprouts from the third day . Make sure you water these at least twice a week so they don’t dry out! When your beetroots begin to sprout you will start to see little purple shoots.

Around then, it’s a good idea to move your beetroots to somewhere with a  more room. For example, if you have a little garden space. Cut up your egg boxes and plant them in a little pre-dug plot. If you don’t have the garden space available, a big box will work just as well! The egg boxes will break down as they’re biodegradable anyway.

With this done, all you have to do is keep your beetroot watered and to watch them grow over time.

Then when they are ready it is time to cook them and make lollipops.

 

 

 

 

A Planntadh Biotas le Daoine Beaga

Tha biotas furast gu lèor fhàs anns an gàrradh, agus ‘s e fear dha na glasraich as fhèarr leinn a th’ ann. Tha do 5-gach-latha cudrothmach agus biotas blasta agus math dhut.  ‘S urrainn dhuibh an cleachdadh ann am brot, cèicichean, an ròstadh neo fiù ‘s ann an salad. Tha e còrdadh riumsa biatas a chur air forc agus an ithe mar ‘lollipop’. 

‘S e glasrach sgoinneil a th’ann airson fàs le clann, oir tha sìol aige mòr agus furast gu leòr a chuir sgàth ‘s nach eil è ro dhuilich airson corragan beaga an togail. Tha e a’ fàs as fhèarr ann am talamh le beagan stuth-mathachaidh troimhe, ach fàsaidh e ceart gu leòr ann an diofar seòrsan de pholl le beagan cuideachadh. Mar eisempleir, ma tha ur talamh ro shearbh, cuiridh beagan aol sin ceart dhuibh. Fàsaidh biotas as fhèarr nuair nach eil e faisg air planntaichean eile, dèan cinnteach gu bheil rùm gu leòr timcheall air gus am fàs e. Chan fheum thu fiù ‘s a chuir dhan an talamh ann an gàrradh, tha e comasach fàs ann an soitheach a choireigin!

Ma tha sibh airson misneachd a thoirt don òigridh a’ tha sibh a cuideachadh sa gharradh, ‘s e biotas deagh thaghadh airson seo a’ dhèanamh. Tha e furast’ gu leòr a’ phlanntadh, agus fàsaidh e a mhòr chuid dhan an tìd’. Bheir e beagan ùine gus am faic sibh e briseadh tron an talamh, ach na gabh dragh oir tha e fhathast a’ fàs ged nach faic sibh e!

Chleachd sinne bucais-uighean. Thagh sinn iad seo gus am b’ urrainn dhuinn am planntadh dhan talamh as deidh druiseag bheag fàs, ach mar nach eil rùm agaibh airson sin a’ dheanamh ni soitheach meadhanach mòr an aon rud. An toiseach feumaidh sibh beagan poll anns gach pìos dhan am bucas. Cuidichidh làmhan beag leis an seo co-dhiù!

Mar a chì thu an seo, tha mìol biotas mòr gu leòr ‘s gun tog nan làmhan beaga iad an airde cuideachd. Feumaidh sibh aon phìos mìol anns gach roinn den bhucas. Cuir gach pìos mìol am meadhan am poll agus brùth sios air le ur chorrag mus cuir sibh poll air a mhullach. Tha sin furast’ gu leòr airson làmhan beaga ur cuideachadh.

Bu chòir don bhiotas ginideachadh ann an ceithir latha deug, agus chì thu duilleagan beag as deigh timcheall air trì latha aig a ‘char as tràithe. Chan fheum thu ach bùrn a chuir air turas neo dhà gach seachdain gus nach fàs iad tioram. Nuair a tha nam biotas a briseadh tron am poll chì thu duilleagan beag purpaidh. 

Timcheall air an àm seo, ‘s e dèagh smuain a th’ ann nam biotas a ghluasad gu àite anns a bheil beagan a bharrachd rùm. Mar eisempleir, ma tha beagan gàrradh agaibh, geàrr an airde na bucais-uighean agud cuir iad dhan an talamh ann am plota beag. Mar nach eil comas gàrradh agaibh, nì bucas mor le poll a chùis cuideachd! Brisidh nam bucais-uighean sìos oir tha iad bith-chnàmhach co-dhiù.

Leis an seo deànt, chan fheum sibh ach air burn a chuir air ur biotas bho àm gu àm, agus cumail sùil air mar a tha iad a fàs thairis air ùine. 

 

Training for Nursery Staff

Since Tim has come back from doing the Forest Kindergarten Training he has been working with the Early Years team to help them develop their skills.

He ran a pilot course with the combined nursery staff in Tong school and will be running a trainer course in November 2019.

Although the course is called forest it is not just aimed at forests, the training is aimed at helping early years practitioners to take the young people they work with outside more regularly.

The model used is to consider the Place, the People and the Pedagogy;

Considering the Place involves the suitability and the practical steps needed to manage the young people in the place.

The People thinks about who is involved; the young people, the staff, the carers/parents managing their needs and expectations.

Pedagogy is the how what and why we take young people outdoors

A possible visual model:

The objective it to show practitioners the connectivity and to challenge them to consider the elements in their own practice.

This is partly done inside through conversation, which because of time constraints is done inside.

The final session on pedagogy was done outside in the fantastic garden area of the school. The practitioners were given opportunity to play. This, apart from being great fun in the rain, highlighted for this group the importance of child lead learning and how few resources they needed as the environment provides them. They saw imaginative play, social skills development, gross motor skills, fine motor skills and peer learning happen within their own group and considered how they could use this in their own practice.

Small world play

 

 

 

 

Exploring the Moor with Tong School

The class were doing a project on black houses and wanted to look at and explore the moor behind the school. Tim first looked round the village to see if there were the remains of any black houses on the crofts but sadly in Tong he couldn’t find any, so the decision was to have a walk out onto the moor, look at how it was different to the rest of the village and how the land might be being used.

The class used the Outdoor Journeys model developed by Simon Beames at Edinburgh University as a start point to prepare. Tim went into the class and they looked at the map and discussed the potential hazards, wrote this out before completing their journey plan to be left a the school before they set off. (Here are the CnES versions of the documents; Journey Plan, Hazard Assessment)

The walk went out of the school up the road, left out towards Craignish and the followed the peat tracks past the fank to the 42m high point. Then before turning to head for the wind turbine and then back down Barraidmhicille Mhoire to the school.

It was a very frosty afternoon so frozen puddles were a great source of interest with everyone looking at the ice and then jumping on it to smash it.

As part of the project to look at how people lived in black houses the class learnt the song Eilean Fraoich, they thought it would be good if they stood on top of some peat banks and sang the song.

On the way round the moor the class looked at the plants and birds they saw, it was so cold they came to the conclusion that was why they didn’t see many birds apart from seagulls.

The cold wasn’t bothering the cattle we  saw near to the end of the journey.

The journey ended back a the school and the inevitable ‘wellies off scrum’ and lots of smiling faces.

Environmental Studies with Breasclete School

Tim went to Breasclete School to explore the croft land next to the school, there were plenty of invertebrates including a spider who was ‘snacking’ on a fly. The young people used the Field Studies Council fold out charts to identify the species and plants they found and collated the information using cameras and drawing.

Environmental Studies with Tong School

Tim was asked by Tong School to show them how they could use the moorland, a short walk from the school, to look at the fauna and flora they could find there.

The class wrote their own journey plan to get out to the moor and they organised the class to get there. When they arrived at the moor using the Outdoor Team’s environmental box they researched the plants and invertebrates they found documenting them with photographs and drawings.

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