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Lessons with the Wiltshire WWT
Hearing impaired children discover the
wondrous woodland on their doorstep
Building towers out of twigs, sparking fires out of fungi, investigating
the contents of owls’ stomachs and sniffing woodland smells from rotten bark to
fox poo is not the typical structure of a school day. Yet a group of five
students including those from our hearing impaired unit have been doing all this
and more in a project between the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust and The Ridgeway
School.
To help our students experience the wonderful array of wildlife on their
doorstep, the Trust has been encouraging them to use their senses to explore
Clouts Wood, a Trust nature reserve near Wroughton.
Dean Sherwin, the Trust’s Environmental Youth Officer felt the project
used Clouts Wood as a means of heightening the students senses to provide a
richer and more fulfilling woodland experience. The sessions have seen the
student attitude shift from that of: “Everything is gross in this wood”, to a
sense of amazement at the complexity and beauty of a woodland world.
The students, aged 10 to 14 years, made colour palettes, collecting as
many different shades of colour of woodland items as they could and stuck them
to cards. They used their observational powers to explore the micro world of the
mini beasts, and sought out contrasting textures such as rough, tickly, slimy,
bumpy and feathery in a scavenger hunt. Taste buds were tuned up with some food
that was cooked over a camp fire, for which the children collected King Alfred’s
Cakes – a fungus that grows on dead ash trees and makes brilliant lighting
‘bricks’ for the camp fire. It wasn’t just their own diet they observed – the
young people dissected barn owl pellets that Dean had brought with him.
“Ordinarily the girls would never have come here, yet they are learning
so much. They have learnt about food chains in the classroom, but here they are
seeing it in action – from the catkins, that turned into nuts that the mice ate,
which the owls then ate – it’s all brought alive for them. We will use these
experiences to help them develop their writing, science and presentation
skills,””Mrs Wilding Hearing Impaired Teacher at the Ridgeway.
A Little About the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust
One of the UK’s leading nature conservation charities, Wiltshire Wildlife
Trust has 18,500 members and supporters, and more than a thousand volunteers,
working to conserve the Wiltshire countryside and the rich variety of plants and
animals that live there.
The Trust owns or manages 2,000 acres of nature reserves that provide
havens for plants and animals. It also advises landowners on how to manage their
land with wildlife in mind, and comments on structure plans and planning
applications that affect sites of wildlife interest. The Trust is also actively
promotes energy efficiency and waste prevention in the home, community wildlife
programmes and environmental education.
Visit:
www.wiltshirewildlife.org
Clouts Wood 1
Clouts
Wood 2
Clouts
Wood 3
Clouts
Wood 4
http://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/7987039.Children__go_back_to_nat/
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