Tag Archives: celebrations

From sea eagles to young children: training courses this autumn

TRAINING WORKSHOPS, AUTUMN 2013

Time for glue, imaginations, inspirations and wild and rewarding days! Flex those elbows, wiggle those fingers and give your inspiration a boost!

capturing landscapes

September Saturday 28th: Celebrating Wildlife I am running workshops at this exciting event in Portree on Skye organised by the Skye and Lochalsh Environment Forum.. I’ll be running one session on building new environmental stories and another that i suspect will end up with either lots of dramatic sea-eagle, otter and wild cat masks or beautiful, elegant landscape sculptures in card…or both

Official blurb:   “Join SLEF and a wide range of other organisations to celebrate the biodiversity of Skye & Lochalsh. Based in  Portree High School, activities will include wild stories, art, photography competition, lots of free stuff, advice about wildlife recording and how to get involved, music, drama….. Also a chance to discuss the future of the Local Biodiversity Action Plan document – due to be revised during winter 2013/14.” Visit the SLEF website for more information: http://www.slef.org.uk/events/28-sep-2013-celebrating-wildlife.asp

October15, 16, 17th 3 Nights of Lanterns: willow, tissue and glue! Three workshops to learn willow making techniques- in return we hope you can spare some time to help families make their own lanterns at our public workshops in November   Its not necessary to attend all the workshops but beneficial if you can

Tuesday 15th October 7pm til 9pm Willow lanterns & fixings: starting with the quick ones – a chance to meet materials and get a feel for how willow works and just what you can do with some wet tissue paper and glue!

hard at work: covering

Wednesday 16th October 7pm til 9pm More complex willow lanterns & Starting large sculptures: getting more adventurous: with me, you can try your hand at willow fish, processional people or whatever takes your fancy: looking at the basic principles involved in making more complex shapes that can still be carried. While I’m doing that the wonderful Mark Hornsey from the Babbling Vagabonds will be starting work on some static lantern installations and looking at some much bigger things

Thursday 17th October 6pm until 9pm Large willow sculptures: Mark is leading this session when the ideas from Wednesday really come to life!

Please book – limited places- invite anyone you know who may be interested e mail buxtonsparkles@gmail.com for more details   Materials and tools will be provided. Dress for mess!

November 2 training courses down in Devon. These days are designed to give participants that opportunity to try activities but also to pause and think, to plan and to share ideas, experiences and issues with each other. Rich, rewarding days in a wonderful setting – come and join us!

  Monday 4th Celebrations!

9.30 – 4.30

Dartington Estate

£115/£95/£70

Organised by Wildwise: contact them for more information or to make a booking

“we live in a world worth celebrating” – and this workshop will help you do just that. From first inspirations and wild ideas through planning the event to activities to excite and engage people, Celebrations will help you organise your own occasions of wonder and delight. With lanterns, flags, processional masks and tiny installations, there will be activities to try and materials to improvise with Who the course is for: Teachers, youth and play workers, environment and community workers and anyone who is hoping to get people out and doing something adventurous and creative in their local area

What will you take away:

  • ways of getting people started; how to spark first ideas and encourage imagination
  • a plan for designing celebrations with groups
  • checklists for yourself – points to cover
  • ways of using the immediate environment to offer stories and settings for celebrations
  • discussions about traditional celebrations and new ideas – principles and goals to look for in a celebration
  • the experience of trying activities for yourself: processional flags, tiny installations, lanterns, masks, puppets – small and very large

 

small boats offer tiny adventures for young children

Tuesday 5th

Adventures with younger children!

9.30 – 4.30

Dartington Estate

£115/£95/£70

organised by Wildwise: contact them for more information and to make bookings

 

Build your own toolkit of activities and themes to use with younger children. Looking at a world full of stories, we can use the world around us to inspire language, encourage communication and foster a deep sense of excitement in and connection with that world – and discover the best pizza for a troll, who hides on the other side of the tree and how to call a dragon from a flowerbed. Using readily transferable techniques and easily sourced materials, this workshop will encourage us to value and cherish the creativity of younger children

 

Who the course is for:
Early Years teachers, Forest School practitioners, family centre and playgroup leaders, environmental education and countryside staff

What will you take away:

  • ways of building storylines with young children that help us shape their experience and learning
  • activities to encourage creative exploration
  • event ideas for family groups
  • direct experience of a range of activity ideas for outside storybuilding to rainy day alternatives, mixing discovery with story, drama, art and craft ideas
  • the value of tiny things and the power of giants

 

A weekend of messy lantern making!

 

ready for action

Padfield Lanterns

photos and feedback from two excessively sticky days in Hadfield Hall this weekend. 70 people on Saturday and maybe 90 today (Sunday). Trying to work out a collective noun for lanterns: an adhesion of lanterns? a glue of lanterns? a spike? an accumulation?

 

accumulated lanterns

These were lovely days and I can only thank both the Hadfield Hall helpers, High Peak Community Arts and all those well-glued members of the public with their good humour and patience as more and more people arrived and we gradually ran out of willow

Other comments come from participants…

hard at work: sponging

 

Very helpful staff, as a Grandma I needed help which I got lots of. Alfie had a good time sticking! We will see you all on Friday

 

 

My children and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. Gordon was very helpful and entertaining. Much fun was had by all of us. Would love to do it again


Brilliant! Very well organised and well run. Fab morning + can’t wait for Friday


Really brilliant

hard at work: covering


Nice workshop, not rigid, so children could chose own designs which we liked.

 


Lovely idea, Beau really enjoyed it, looking forward to the parade and hope its on again next year when we can try something more ambitious when they are older

almost finished
stars were popular, even with rather grisly greetings!
evidence of hard work!
lanterns stacked, stored and waiting for the final procession



Learning Outside The Classroom – new courses!

NEW LOTC COURSES 2012
Afternoon workshops

“Learning Outside The Classroom” courses with the Peak District National Park

 

NATURAL CELEBRATIONS

9th January 2012 , Flash School near Buxton

waving giant at the Just-so Festival, 2011

How do we get our classes to take hold of their own inspirations and work together to create exciting and dramatic events? What activities can capture the colours and patterns of nature for our celebrations?

 

This workshop will offer:

• activities to help groups plan and design celebrations

• a look at creative themes you might use in a celebration

• give you a chance to try some useful  art activities with lanterns, flags, big masks, spectacular standards and unbelievable hats…

• take time for us all to share ideas and experiences

All courses run from 1:30 – 5:30pm and cost £70. If your school books more than one of any of our charged for courses you will receive a 20% discount on all courses.

 

Newham, London: processing through the local park

For more details, please contact:

Sarah Wilks, Tel: 01433 620373     learning.discovery@peakdistrict.gov.uk

 

MATHS NATURALLY

21st March 2012, at Losehill Hall Youth Hostel, Castleton,

Based around a maths treasure hunt, come and discover how learning in the fresh air can help develop an enthusiasm for maths, as well as deepen mathematical understanding and thinking.

shapes, patterns, sizes and silhouettes - an old oak has so much to offer!

This workshop will offer:

• activities to develop mathematical skills in real life contexts

• working with maps and coordinates to engage pupils and encourage them to lead their own learning

• developing maths through story and drama activities

• activities that use a kinaesthetic approach to teaching maths OR enjoying maths through hands-on, engaging making and doing

 

 

All courses run from 1:30 – 5:30pm and cost £70. If your school books more than one of any of our charged for courses you will receive a 20% discount on all courses.

 

For more details, please contact:

Sarah Wilks, Tel: 01433 620373     learning.discovery@peakdistrict.gov.uk

and pirates offer coordinates, geometries, distances, depths and arguments over the fair sharing of treasures!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ADVENTURES EVERYWHERE

22nd March 2012 Moorland Discovery Centre, National Trust Longshaw Estate, Hathersage

small hands create precise stories with natural objects...

Step out of the classroom and into a world where everything around us is having adventures. The processes and patterns of nature, the lives of animals and plants, all offer rich inspirations for new poems and wild stories

Looking for Adventures Everywhere, during the afternoon we will:

• shape communal poems out of special moments and memories

• work outside building our own storywalk: with activities that could work either joined together to create a whole experience or that might stand alone as individual exercises: atmosphere poems, riddles, animal diaries and wildlife characters

• make laced-up books drawing all these earlier activities together

• end with a quick story-telling session, sharing our new poems and stories

 

All courses run from 1:30 – 5:30pm and cost £70. If your school books more than one of any of our charged for courses you will receive a 20% discount on all courses.

 

For more details, please contact:

Sarah Wilks, Tel: 01433 620373     learning.discovery@peakdistrict.gov.uk

Workshop leader:Gordon MacLellan: as Creeping Toad, Gordon has been leading celebrations with schools and community groups for more than 20 years. From playschemes with hundreds of children to quiet garden events, Gordon’s experience reaches from South African arts festivals to Manchester schools, from Highland woods to Buxton’s lantern processions.