DUCKS: Where a Walk in the Woods Inspires Learning Adventures

At DUCKS a new adventure opens up every day, leading our young explorers down paths of their own choosing. A great example of that happened recently when a simple walk in the woods inspired an entire learning adventure culminating with our Early Years Reception Kingfishers Class coming face to face with none other than the Gruffalo.

Ms. Mandy Jacquelin, Reception Kingfishers Class Teacher, gives a great explanation of how this student-led approach works in practice: 

"This particular unit started with a nature walk where we made observations on the seasonal changes taking place around us. Some of the children talked about going to the forest and they brought into the classroom natural objects they had found. 

Building on this we turned our role play area into a forest complete with a den which developed over time into a monster hiding in the forest. The familiar story of The Gruffalo complemented the direction of learning enabling us to take the opportunity to introduce it using the Talk for Write method."

Student-led exploration is a critical avenue for Early Years skill development, in this case, reading and writing.

Talk for Writing is a powerful approach enabling children to read and write independently for a variety of audiences and purposes. It moves from dependence towards independence with the teacher using guided teaching to encourage children to speak and write creatively and powerfully. The key phases of the Talk for Writing process enable children to imitate orally the language they need for a particular topic before reading and analysing it and creating their own version.

The key was capitalising on the children's inherent excitement to engage them throughout the learning journey. The teachers did that by creating further opportunities to extend the learning ultimately incorporating all of the Prime and Specific areas of our Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum:

• The children made props to enhance their imaginative play.
   
• They recounted, re-enacted, and adapted the Gruffalo story both verbally and written, making use of phonetic knowledge.
   
• The characters of the story were available for use in Small World play.
   
• The students manipulated malleable materials to make characters.
   
• They used stencils of initial sounds to create phonics craft.
   
• They listened to a recipe and followed instructions on how to make a Gruffalo sandwich.

"From start to finish the children led the direction of where their learning took them," says Ms. Mandy Jacquelin. "Every child was appropriately challenged in many aspects to an extent they were comfortable with. Our goal for this unit was to extend their Communication and Language skills, which was successfully achieved. However, the initial goals were surpassed, and new ones created enabling more areas of the curriculum to be included."

Where will your next walk in the woods take you?

Learn more about our Early Years programme at DUCKS in this video below, with an introduction from Head of DUCKS, Ms. Katherine Weir-Davis.