Hello Everybody.
A brilliant day was had by all on the 21st. The school celebrated John Muir day, where 3 classes, other than ourselves, were taking to the woods, 2 classes also doing the John Muir Award.The pupils were asked to come in with beards to celebrate the man’s long beard and I was touched that several did, including myself!
The weather was dry and we had a great fire to celebrate, as the weather was still a bit nippy.
1. We first sat by the fire and the pupils shared their interesting facts about John Muir. We talked about his 1000 mile journey and his love of wild spaces.
2. I read a quote that JM made about everything in the universe is connected and then asked the pupils to go up, in pairs, find a living organism ie beetle, bush and try to connect this with as many other living things in the universe. The pupils were great and with support saw connections to the sun, rain, the ground, the moon and indeed the universe. A great activity.
3. After snack and roasted marshmallows we took up the theme that JM create the first National Park in Yosemite. We talked about the importance of National Parks, our nearest park ie the Cairngorms, and then embarked on a challenge. The pupils, using string, had to map out their own national park round the special places. They could then invite friends in to see their ‘wild space’.
4. The pupils then were given some clay and had to create a wood spirit to look over their special National park.
Evaluation and Personal Reflection.
This day was a lot of fun and we were fortunate that our forest day coincided! There was a feeling of a festival and it was good to be prepared so the day had that more special meaning to the pupils. The beards went down a storm and doing some research with JM quotes ( used the special JM pack sent out to schools) made the activities more meaningful. As ever, it was all more relevant and special to the pupils, sitting round a fire and talking about JM used to do this. Always coming back to the points of sustainability, biodiversity and our role in looking after things. No better place to discuss these than sitting in a forest. i was touch by how the pupils have taken to their special places and the way they showed them off to their friends.