EYFS

Central idea: Humans can explore their environment to find out about the world around them. 

Line of Inquiry 2: An inquiry into how outside experiences can be recorded.

We started the inquiry with a discussion around how we could record our outside experiences. 

The children worked collaboratively with their talk partners to create the following list: 

We took our learning outside and headed to the outdoor classroom. There, we selected the drawing materials we wanted to use before starting our observational drawings. 

Leo: This stick is bumpy so I am drawing bumpy, wavy lines. 

Olivia: I am using soft lines and bumpy lines. 

Ada: I am drawing the muddy puddle so I am pressing hard and making dark lines. 

Mollie: I am drawing a tree that is far away. I will use little lines for the branches on my drawing but I know that branches are really big! 

Harry: My leaf has a rip in it so I will draw a spiky line to show where it is ripped. 

The children were encouraged to look carefully for details and use different thicknesses of line to create a more accurate representation of what they could see. 

We spent considerable time outside filming and taking photographs too. Upon return to the classroom we wrote about our experiences where we started to use descriptive language. 

We spent some time outside listening carefully to the different sounds that we could hear. We recorded videos to tell other people what we heard. 

Following our time outside we discussed the colours that we could see. 

Tom-Henry: There is lots of green outside. The leaves are green, the grass is green. There is lots of green. 

We used different paints and food colouring in water to mix the primary colours, blue and yellow, and match it to different leaves we found outside.

Andy Goldsworthy is a British artist, specialising in sculpture and installations. He works collaboratively with nature, using only items / resources found outside to create his art. 

Otis: I am going to use crunchy leaves.

Mila: I am going to use squelchy and slimy mud. 

Henry: I'm using a stick and pine cones to make it.

Silas: I will use spiky sticks like Andy to make a beautiful circle!

We look forward to creating sculptures inspired by Andy Goldsworthy in the coming days.