Take your kids searching for nature

This is an old idea, but as the saying goes, 'The old ones are the best!' A nature hunt is guaranteed to make any child, big or small, want to get outside. It takes a bit of planning but if you know your local area well, you should know which plants / trees etc are around at which time of year.

The idea is very simple. Give each child a sheet of paper with a list of things that they need to find or spot in the surrounding countryside. This could be a certain flower e.g bluebellls, types of seeds, different leaves, butterflies, insects etc. You can also add other things e.g. people walking, birds singing.The activity can easily be varied for different ages. For little children, draw pictures of each object they need to spot so that they can match them up - great for teaching them about different leaf shapes and flower types. For older children, just write the word or even give them a clue.

Stress that they do not need to pick the item, just find it and look at it. Then they can mark it off on their sheet. You can easily make it into a race for older children and see who can find all the objects the quickest - perhaps give them a little camera each to photograph their findings to avoid any possibility of cheating!!
Younger children can just colour or tick their items as they find them.

To make the nature hunt more attractive, put something really enticing on the sheet e.g. treasure!, and tell them they can find that in the garden when they get home. An ice lolly will always go down well, or perhaps a hot chocolate in winter!

This is a great activity as it can be adapted for all ages and numbers of children and is a brilliant way of getting children looking closely at the world around them. It also works well at different times of the year and allows you to teach children about the way nature changes with the seasons.

Have fun!