Jan 17, 2023 | Developing School Grounds & Outdoor Spaces, Early Years Outdoors, Play Resources
One of the big surprises many years ago was the versatile way in which children chose to play with a pair of Cosy willow lattice arches. When I first saw these in a Derby nursery, I could see they were very open-ended. I was not surprised that the children used them...
Jan 15, 2023 | Early Years Outdoors, Gardening, Technologies
There is an irony about travelling to Canada to attend a workshop to learn about a practice that stems from the British Isles. As part of the IPA Canada 2017 conference, Evergreen staff provided a more natural approach to the use of loose parts. Evergreen is a...
Jan 14, 2023 | Developing School Grounds & Outdoor Spaces, Gardening, Social Subjects Outdoors
I’m a big fan of willow structures in school grounds and outdoor spaces. In a previous post Clare Revera explained the benefits of these living sculptures. So you can imagine my excitement and delight when visiting The Coombes School, many years ago, I found...
Jan 12, 2023 | Early Years Outdoors, Gardening
This is blog post is co-written by myself and Clare Revera. She is a consultant and trainer who used work at Out to Learn Willow. This company specialises in training adults and children in the traditional craft of willow weaving, using dried and living willow. They...
Jul 1, 2024 | Early Years Outdoors, Nature Play & Learning
I receive a lot of queries about outdoor nurseries, out-of-school clubs, forest kindergartens and nature kindergartens in Scotland. This post lists the ones I am aware of, but please, if you know of others, then please do get in touch and tell me more. One...
