Early November European Wilderness Mentors of BSH der Hoffbauer gGmbH organised a wilderness camp for their own children or younger siblings. A mixed age group of kids (4-12 years) spent a day and a night outside in the area of Seddiner See south of Potsdam. The camp was set up on a meadow embedded in…
I must admit, I´m fed up with pandemic stipulations. Period. At home we are less affected and can work our way around them. But at work in an urban kindergarten with a rather blank outdoor area and without the opportunity to bring the children to places with more nature … my, it´s a real challenge!…
Some years ago I made my own Bo Weslien style model of a foldable outdoor saw at Sjövik Folkhögskola. Having no machines at hand back home for high precision wood engineering I was thinking of making a copy of it out of green wood and traditional tools: a froe for splitting a small log to…
Let the children team up as bird parents or eggs/chicks. Help the “bird parents” build a makeshift nest from twigs, grass, or pillows, whatever you have available. Then place the “eggs” into the nest, have the children kneel there and make themselves very small. Instruct the bird parents to warm the eggs with their wings…
On a walk near some flooded meadows and reeds I found an eggshell. I´m not sure if it´s from a swan or a goose, both are known to breed there and both the size and colour of the eggs can be almost alike. But the time of year and surrounding tracks presented a nice puzzle…
For a nature reconnection day with our course we had the idea to weave little baskets for collecting herbs with our mentees. We were trying different materials. Blackberry vines seemed rather suitable after getting rid of the stings. For that we were using an empty tin in which we had drilled a 5mm hole…
Usually we get very little snow in my region during the winter. So when we found ourselves in a snow-covered world last week, the children in my kindergarten group were really excited and we decided to go for a walk to a park in our neighbourhood. Under normal conditions this park is quite dull but snow has…
When we were planning a pedagogic programme some of our course members sometimes had a hard time to focus on the task at hand. The pedagogic programme had the 4 elements for a central theme, so I came up with a corresponding meditation sequence to try and help with grounding and focussing our awareness and…
This is the story of my first self-made spoon – or actually spork. It took me 2 days to finish it and I felt quite proud. Sure, it was a little crooked, but I had put some effort in it and let the texture of the wood be my guide. I used this spoon to…
If we want to deepen our connection to nature and our surroundings, we have to engage all senses. We use our visual sense nearly all the time and often even remember to listen and to feel, but to really address our reptilian brain and embed a place in our sensory memory, taste and smell are…