Joshua's 'Away Day'

Today Joshua and I attended a special "Away Day!" His school sponsored a special outing for all the new P1 pupils. He got to meet his new classmates (many we already new from nursery) and had a great day fun. The outing was held at the Aberdeen Ranger center at Lochinch Farms.

After snacks, our first activity was a nature walk through the fields and woods. They gave us a check list of things find and questions about our observations. Joshua loved taking notes about the things he found and ended up asking me to write down everything he saw that was of interest.

One of our observations was about the texture of trees. Joshua did bark rubbings on several different trees to compare the texture and markings.

Near the loch / pond there was a little bird-watching shed. Much to Joshua's pleasure, they supplied extra binoculars for the kids to use. We saw beautiful swans, great blue herons, fish jumping at the bugs and lots of diving ducks.

After the nature walk (and a prize of bubbles, and a little time on the playground), we headed back to the ranger station for some more activities. The kids got to decorate their own t-shirts. Joshua insisted on doing all the work himself, but kindly asked if I would help hold the shirt in place while he colored.

Before beginning the next activity, Joshua asked if he could wear his shirt for the rest of the day. Then he started the exciting task of decorating two cupcakes with frosting, gummies and sprinkles. "One is for me and one for my sister," he explained to his teacher. Very sweet of him to remember Abigail, who was quite disappointed that she couldn't attend the Away Day, too.

Back at the playground, Joshua is sporting his newly decorated t-shirt. He wrote his name, then drew a fire engine, a castle and a tree in the autumn. After a little more play, the ranger took the kids on a bug hunt (beasties hunt, as they call it here). The kids had nets and caught butterflies, moths, spiders and any number of other things.

This was a great day out. Joshua seems to have new confidence and excitement about starting P1 in August. He also really enjoyed getting to know his new teacher, Mrs. Ritchie (who we learned really likes Percy the Park Keeper, one of our favorite book series). Check out the rest of our pictures from the day on FB.