Our Daily Forest Play

One of the best things about being right next to a forest is the opportunity to visit the same natural space many times.
The hope is the children will form a relationship with, and feel a connection to the land. Doing that takes time.

 It is exciting to adventure into uncharted territory. Discover a new climbing tree, and picking the perfect place to build a fort.

 What a great feeling, then, to be able to return to the same space, to reconnect with that tree or that fort, to realize that the unknown trail now feels comfortable and familiar.

Daily visits to 'our spot', offer the children who are more hesitant and unsure the chance to observe familiar territory and proceed at their own pace.

As an educator, I love being able to say to a group of children, “We’ll be back. It’s time to leave now, but we will be back.” 

And when a child says, “Remember how hard it was to climb that tree the first day? I think it’s easy now.” or “There was so much snow and ice here when we started, and now there are leaves on the trees."


This is same land but it is also different. This land is no longer just the place where the trees grow and surrounding neighbours walk their dogs. It has become their play land, and they care about it and it’s creatures. They have a relationship with it. That took time.

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