Rainy Day Kids Adventure Book E-Book

Steph Scott

• Herausgeber: Batsford
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 86

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

A practical companion to help kids enjoy outdoor activities and adventures even when it's rainy, snowy or windy. As the weather turns into autumn and the kids start watching more television and stare at the computer, how can you get them out and about to enjoy the cooler months? Outdoor enthusiasts Steph and Katie are teachers and mothers and have years of experience of finding new and novel ways to get kids to enjoy the great outdoors, whatever the weather. This great little tome is packed with ideas for games, activities and nature crafts that are perfectly suited to the autumnal and winter months of rain and wind. Activities range from puddle painting and making your own nature paint brushes, to making wind spinners from golden leaves and feathers. Why not try puddle pouncing or raindrop racing, or create a pool and spa for an elf? Or make a leafy woven kite, windmill or nature parachute for the windy weather? Nature offers loads of autumnal bits and bobs just waiting for a creative hand. And if you don't want to stay out for too long, the book lists things to collect outdoors for taking home and used for stay-at-home projects. The book encourages youngsters to see the excitement of wind, snow, rain and to enjoy the elements with fun projects that excite the imagination.

Leseprobe

Rainy Day Kids

ADVENTURE

BOOK

Rainy Day Kids

ADVENTURE

BOOK

Steph Scott and Katie Akers

To Allan, KT’s Pa, without whom none of this would ever have happened. S.S. To Pa. K.A.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

The Out Pack

How to Forage

What is an Outpacker?

How to Remember Your Seasons

RAIN

WIND

SNOW

SKILLS

So You’re an Outpacker!

Other Fun Stuff to See and Read

Index

Acknowledgements

About the Authors

Deep in the woods there’s a place that shines.

A place that only you can find.

A place where magic is written in the trees.

Upon the dew and the gentle breeze.

There are flowers, streams and real-life dreams,

dragons dodging bright sunbeams.

It’s a place you are brave and quick and smart,

where you can hear nature’s beating heart.

There’s so much to hear

and say and do.

Go and find it,

it’s waiting just for you.

INTRODUCTION

Welcome back to you all: children, parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, teachers, forest-school leaders and childminders, and to all flora and fauna everywhere, this time joined by all things weathery. Just as in our previous book, Let’s Go Outside, whether you are already passionate about nature and the outdoors or are just taking your first steps out into a rainy day adventure, you are very welcome. This book is written for you all.

The Rainy Day Kids Adventure Book is the second in our series of activity books for children aged 3–99 years. It is all about weather. The rainy stuff, the windy stuff and all that stuff that comes along when it’s really cold outside. Other books focus on all the wonderful things you can do indoors when it’s wet or chilly, but this one’s about what you can do outdoors! So shout ‘Yippee!’, put on your mac, pull on your wellies and run outside. A marvellous, multi-sensory adventure playground awaits you.

THE OUT PACK

Just as in our first book, Let’s Go Outside, all our ideas truly come to life when you also have the Out Pack. It’s the other bit that you need to make the magic happen. The Out Pack is your child’s own special backpack containing all the bits and pieces required to complete the activities, in addition to a few items that they can easily forage from nature. Your child’s Out Pack is any bag that’s comfy for them to wear and can hold everything they need. You might want to think about getting a backpack that is waterproof, for obvious reasons!

What your child might choose to do today depends only on their mood, the season, the weather and how much outdoor space and time is available. Together you could make a Mr Snowman Head (see here) or fly a woven kite (see here). You could find out how the rain is made or where the wind comes from.

As long as you know a cloud from a breeze and an ice flake from a puddle, you’re ready for some adventures.

WHAT’S IN THE OUT PACK?

All the items in the Out Pack are easy to find and cheap to buy. You may already have some of them at home. Be sure to keep it well stocked so you don’t run out of any essentials while you’re out and about. This is a list of what we keep in our Out Packs…

□ This book!

□ Coloured pens

□ Masking tape You won’t need anything thicker than 12mm wide

□ Wool You can get two balls of different colours, a multi-coloured ball or just a ball of your favourite colour

□ Plastic-coated garden wire You can buy this in a reel with a safe cutter from anywhere that sells garden supplies

□ Elastic bands Flat elastic bands of many colours are useful

□ Paperclips

□ Ball of string

□ Wooden beads Big and small, bumpy and smooth

□ Child-friendly scissors They must be able to cut string

A SMALL NOTE

The Rainy Day Kids Adventure Book and the Out Pack are intended for interactive adventures outdoors. Children will need your help and supervision with many parts of the creative process. We recommend that when the Out Pack is open, there is an adult nearby to lend a hand. When your child’s Out Pack is at home and not being played with, it is best placed in a high spot out of their reach. There are items in there that children need a helping hand with, and we’re sure that you’d rather not wind that ball of string up again and again and again!

HOW TO FORAGE

Foraging is a wonderful skill that will help your child with every part of their Out Pack experience. It is basically about searching and finding. Kids love to pick up bits and pieces from nature, so they’re likely very accomplished foragers already. In a nutshell, it’s about helping your child to search for and find whatever they might be looking for, and it’s especially about helping them to know what is okay to take from nature. It’s about gathering this up and discovering not only how incredible all these treasures are, but also the wonderful things that we can make with them.

Foraging is a long walk for the perfect stick – it’s finding the sycamore pod that flies best and knowing when you’ve found a weeping willow and how it can help you make a million and one things.

WET, WINDY AND FROSTY FORAGING!

It’s fun to forage whatever the weather. When it’s windy you can forage things as they float past you in the breeze! But it is also fun to be able to make your rainy, windy, snowy creations as soon as the weather rolls in. So perhaps you could keep a box of sticks and nature bits in your house and then you can get Out Packing straight away. And while we do want you to get out in wet, windy and cold days, it’s important not to stay out for too long. Numb little fingers can’t tie knots!

Most of the creations in The Rainy Day Kids Adventure Book can be made with bits and pieces from nature that can be found on the ground. You will, however, also find that there are a handful of creations that require foraging items from nature that are still living. These may be a few wild flowers from a lawn or meadow, a short stick of elder wood, a green leaf from a luscious hedge or a willow shoot.

We have specifically chosen trees and plants that are known to be robust, quick growers that are abundant throughout the year. They are trees and plants that like to be pruned and can cope with us carefully taking small bits from them. Having said that, if you find a willow tree that is looking a bit lacklustre, perhaps leave him until he appears a bit livelier.

HOW DOES IT ALL WORK?

The Rainy Day Kids Adventure Book and your Out Pack are designed for each other. The book has the ideas and the pack delivers the means to achieving them. All you need to do is decide what you are going to do today, go foraging for the bits you need from nature, take out whatever is required from your Out Pack and follow the instructions. The rest is down to your imagination.

WHAT IS AN OUTPACKER?

Outpackers can make an adventure out of any day. They know all about nature and how to take care of it. They also know how to stay warm, dry and safe. Use these rhymes and raps to help you as you take your first steps to becoming an Outpacker…

HOW TO REMEMBER YOUR SEASONS

It can be a bit tricky to remember the seasons, coming and going and going and coming all the time, and as we talk about them a lot in this book, we’ve made up a little rhyme to help you remember them. You can sing it to the tune of the nursery rhyme ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’, or you can say it as a rap, or you can learn it just as it is. It goes like this:

Winter feels so very cold

In spring the little buds unfold

Summer’s green all down the lane

Autumn all comes down again

Seasons come and then they go…

nature’s dazzling magic show!

Let’s go outside on a rainy day and celebrate nature, from the smallest backyard to the largest wilderness. Let’s go outside, wherever you may be.

Let’s have a rainy day adventure and discover the magic of plants, animals, seasons and weather. Let’s marvel at it all.

Let’s go out in the rain and imagine – kids delight in their little piece of crafted nature that can take them to the moon and back.

Let’s go outside in the rain with the Out Pack … Waterproofs, wellies, Out Pack and go!

RAIN

Rain, rain, don’t go away, Tell us that you’ll stay and play.

Shower us with cats and dogs, So we can play at being frogs.

Drizzling, mizzling, pelting down, We splash and splosh … but not a frown.

Rain we’re sorry, we were wrong,You can stay here all day long!

TALKING ABOUT RAIN

Have you ever looked out of the window on a rainy day and heard someone say:

‘Hooray, it’s raining! Let’s all go outside, to sing and dance in the rain!’

You’ve never heard that? Perhaps you’re more used to hearing…

‘Oh dear, it’s raining.’

Or,

‘What a gloomy day.’

Or,

‘Isn’t the weather grim?’

Or even,

‘Oh, it’s MISERABLE outside!’

Rainy weather gets called some horrible names. It’s no wonder that when the clouds open and the raindrops fall, we feel like we ought to stay indoors and out of the wet!

When it’s raining just a little bit we say it’s SPITTING…that doesn’t sound nice. Or when there’s a misty sort of rain we say it’s MIZZLING. Surely nothing sounds more miserable than that! Perhaps we need to get to know it a bit better.