Mudchute Education Project

1. Mudchute Education Project Click here to enter

2. Click to enter Instructions • When you click the link on the bottom right hand of the screen which says “click to enter” you will be taken to a selection page. Click the green box you wish to find information about. The boxes are in order and arrows show where to go next after you have visited the 1st box. • When a new slide opens with the title in green at the top. Click anywhere on the screen and text and pictures will appear! • After you have explored the slide click the link in the bottom right of the screen to go back to the selection page click a title on the selection page to visit another slide.

3. Food & Dairying Outreach workshops Wildflower Hunt Membership Details Membership Package Exploring Trees School based Activities Animal Tour Minibeast Hunting Pond Detectives Arranging a session Guidance Notes Charges for schools Sensory Trail Sheep & Wool The five sense About the farm Welcoming Details Click anywhere on the screen. Then click the circles to enter. Follow the arrows.

4. Back to selection Mudchute Education Project Welcome to the new activities programme The new programme sees many of the original activities remaining with some additional new topics. The education centre provides activities for key stages 1&2 and Nursery groups in both formal and informal educational establishments. The list of new topics will be added to a termly basis where possible, so please feel free to contact the education officer to recommend topics or areas of study which your school and others may find useful. Please note: all images published with consent from visiting schools and groups.

5. Back to selection About the farm • The Mudchute Park and Farm, on the Isle of Dogs, is a 32-acre site with a public park and one of the largest urban farms in the country boasting cows, sheep, horses, goats, pigs, ducks, rabbits, chickens, llamas and Alpacas' ! The Mudchute has a café, riding school and stables, a shop, pet’s corner, nature trail, Living Classroom, Nursery, Children’s Growing Project and After School Club. • The Mudchute Education project based at the Mudchute Park & Farm provides structured Educational, farm and horticultural topics that are closely linked to the demands of the national Curriculum. The Education Project’s has a classroom, a large wildlife area attracting a wide diversity of animals and plants, the Nature Trail, and two ponds, hedgerows and grassland. The Mudchute is continually improving its facilities for both education and public purposes providing an experience of country life for London’s inner-city and an excellent base for study.

6. Back to selection Arranging a session • All sessions with the Education Officer run from 10 am-2pm to suit individual schools, except for independent use, nursery and in-school sessions. Schools should arrange to bring packed lunches, which can be eaten, in the Classroom. The activities will be set up and led by the Education Officer (not for independent use) but schools are expected to provide supervision and support. A minimum of four adults is recommended a preliminary visit to discuss your class and curriculum needs as well as options for the day. • The cost for a session is outlined further in this pack. When emailing to arrange a session your details will later confirmed and your school invoiced for the cost by email. If you need to cancel please email as soon as possible, as a £25.00 cancellation charge will be made for bookings cancelled with less that 10 days notice. Please email to book a session or post/fax a copy of the booking form at the rear of this pack, email: d.lara@btinternet.com

7. Back to selection Charges for schools • Revised details coming soon!

8. Back to selection School Based Activities • These activities are available with an introductory session conducted by the Mudchute Education Officer at your school; all equipment and teachers notes will be brought to your school. All are suitable for key stage 1,2 and nursery. • Hatch & Brood • Incubate and rear chicks or ducklings as a half term project. Incubator and eggs supplied. Teacher’s notes include suggested activities and topic information. Incubating, hatching and rearing chicks in your classroom as a half term project. Key stage 1&2 and nursery .

9. Back to selection Animal Tour WHAT THE DAY INVOLVES • The children take park in several activities based on the farm animals • Painting: Add to our trail of farm animals walking along the ceiling of the centre-every child attending leaves behind something for us….. • Farm Tour: We tour the farm, looking at animals, stroking them and feeding them. Back at the centre the children paint animals to make a large collage which goes back to school. • Animal Modelling: Modelling of farm animals using pictures and posters to help the children identify the different park of an animal.

10. Back to selection Pond Detectives This session can be altered depending upon the age range and ability of the group, but will include sections from the following areas. • Pond Dip: A chance to dip one or both of our ponds, to investigate what lives in the pond. Back in the classroom the group will identify their findings with the use of keys, draw and colour them to add to the large pond collage which will go back to school. • Pond Webbing: The group consider food chains and make ‘food-web’ mobiles to demonstrate the principle. This activity is further enhanced by our pond food-web game, which shows how energy is transferred along the chain and what happen if some chains are broken by environmental changes. • Frog lifecycle: In this session the group will examine the frog lifecycle using books and puzzles to understand metamorphosis. They will also look at how the frog’s lifecycle helps it to exploit habitats. • Pond Art: A creative activity where the children can either make a cardboard or origami ‘jumping frog’ or a brightly coloured dragonfly. • Pond Detectives: Practical and fun activities exploring the plants and animals of the pond habitat. Discover the links through food chains and life cycles.

11. Back to selection Sheep & Wool • This session will focus on sheep, what they look and feel like including differences in their wool, look at how wool is used. The session is divided into four main areas: • Sheep and Shepherd’s Year • Shearing wool and its uses • History of wool • Practical Activities • Sheep and the Shepherd's Year: The group will visit the sheep, stroking their wool and feeding them, (please note that a sheep can only be tethered and stroked when not in lamb). Back in the classroom they can investigate the shepherd's year from dipping, lambing and shearing times. The group can then make a model or a drawing of a sheep. • Shearing, wool and its uses: The group will be shown a fleece and look at the different types of wool from different types of sheep. The group discusses the possible uses of wool and its final products. • History of wool: The group look how wool was processed during times past and how it is done today. The group will be encouraged to discuss the properties of wool and therefore why it is used. • Practical Activities: Carding, spinning and felting is first discussed, exploring the wide uses of felt. The group explore all these areas. What ever they make goes back to school.

12. Sensory Trail • This session encourages the group to explore the Mudchute using their five senses and therefore split into five sections. Following a brief introduction to the farm, their sense and the sensory trail pack, the group will be split into five groups. • Sight: The group feel and look at the bark of different trees, their shape and the shape of its leaves describing how they look and make bark and leaf rubbings to add to the large tree collage which will go back to school. • Taste: The group explores the different taste between cows and goats milk and cheeses? The group will be encouraged to discuss the differences in taste, texture ad flavour. • Sound: Using tape recorders the group record the noises of animals when they are eating, moving and ‘talking’. The sensory trail contains both recorders and animal feed. • Smell: The group sniff and discuss which thing they hate or like, whether it is strong or delicate etc. The group must smell a hay bundle, a pigsty, a mature heap and a leather saddle, noting their opinion on our recording sheet. • Touch: The pack contains examples of animals coats but the children will also get the chance to touch the real things. The group discusses the differences between the coats is of a particular type and length and how humans can use it. • Back in the Classroom - the children review their findings and produce a graph of their favourite and least favourite smells. Try to identify the different animal coats with ‘feely’ bags and play the ‘Listening Game’ using their tape of animal noises.

13. Food & Dairying • The day begins with an introduction which considers where food comes from, how it was made in the past and how it is made today. The introduction will lead onto the following activities: • Where does food come from? The children are encouraged to look at the food on the supermarket shelves and explore their origins. This activity will cover various food types from butter to chocolate to investigate how we change one type of food into another. • Milk: The children will visit the goats and cows, feed them and look at a goat being milked. They can experience how it is done, what the milk looks like and how warm if feels. This activity leads onto why milk is produced by animals and how it ends up in the shops. The children will then draw the parts of the milk process chain to make a large picture. • Food Changes: The children will investigate how one food can be changed into another, wheat to flour to bread. They will then make food changes themselves by making butter, yoghurt and ice-cream from milk. Looking at traditional foods from the farm, includes making dairy products, such as goat milk, yoghurt and bread KS 1&2. Curriculum Focus: Science AT 1,2 &3. History AT 1 & Study Unit: Food and Farming.

14. The five senses • This session uses both indoor and outdoor activities focusing on the environment and the five senses. The day is split into four areas. • Touch: The children join in activities and games exploring their sense of touch, these include: Meet a tree game (a blindfolded activity which explores the different bark textures of trees). Feely Boxes. Touch Collage: (a collection of materials found naturally at Mudchute). • Sound: The games and activities in this section include: Ear game: demonstrates why we need both ears. Sound Maps: Animal Sounds: taping the animals noises and a role play session. Bat & Moth game: demonstrates how bats hunt moths. • Smell: The children explore their sense of smell by smelling various areas of the farm and using a series of smell boxes, having to guess the smells hidden inside (nothing too horrible!). • Sight: The games and activities include: Unnatural Trail: discover the unnatural objects hidden around the Mudchute Nature Trail. Camouflage worms: a game which demonstrates camouflage in nature with our woolly worms. Eye, Eye game: demonstrates why we need two eyes to judge distances. Colour Chips: investigates different colours in nature. • Additional Activities: The following are only available on request by prior arrangement. Taste Buds: tasting farm produce and other foods blindfolded. Guess the Animal game: using questions only, the children have to guess the identity of the creature they are (label attached to their back). Web of Life: demonstrates a food web.

15. Minibeast Hunting • What the day involves: The day begins with an introduction to minibeasts, what do they look like, the different types, where they can be found, etc. This is followed by What Minibeast am I? and/or Minibeast True or False games. The group will then be led through a series of practical activities exploring minibeasts. • Minibeast Hunt: The group will be supervised around Mudchute whilst looking for minibeasts. This will involve tree beating, using pooters and bug jars. Back in the classroom the children will try to identify their findings with the use of keys and guides and draw them under magnification. • Lifecycles: Using slides and the OHP, the group will be introduced to lifecycles and metamorphosis. The children will play the Web of Life game and produce a picture of a lifecycle in either a dragonfly or moth. • Model Minibeasts: The children make a model of either a dragonfly, butterfly or spider to take back to home or school. All models will attempt to be anatomically correct!

16. Wildflower Hunt • Following an introduction to the types of flowers that may be seen, these are investigated as to their importance in food chains. The group will play a Flower True or False game and then undertake the following activities: Investigate a Wildflower: Choosing a common wildflower (such as Dandelion), the children identify the parts of a flower under magnification. Then they will have to construct their own flower using tissue paper and pipe-cleaners to include stems, leaves, petals and stamens. Adopt a Wildflower: The children choose a flower, draw and describe it, name its local conditions (e.g. shade, damp etc.), count its petals, leaves and the number of insects on the flower. Bee Watch: The children choose a patch of wild flowers and observe the bees that visit. By noting how many bees visit, what colour attracts the most bees, a class histogram can be produced. This activity will also look at insect pollination and why there is a dual benefit for both flowers and insects in this method. Colour chips: Using a range of colours the children try to find what colours exist in nature at the Mudchute.

17. Exploring Trees • Following an introduction the group will play two games, What Tree am I? and the Tree True or False game which covers types of trees, trees through the seasons and parts of a tree. Bark & Leaves: This activity explores why trees need both bark and leaves, how leaves make food for trees and other plants, and what makes leaves green. The group will ‘Meet a Tree’, take bark rubbings and collect different leaves to make leaf impressions which will be added to a large tree collage to take back to school. • Trees as Food & Shelter: This session discusses the role of trees as food and shelter for both humans and other life. The activity will help to trace the food seen on the supermarket shelves to its tree origins and tree uses to our everyday lives. • Where do Trees come from? This session includes a short discussion on how trees spread, encouraging the children to think about seed dispersal, and how seeds and plants have adapted for this purpose. It will include sorting seeds by type of dispersal, design their own ‘helicopter seed’ model and play the Seed Survival Game. Tree form: We will look at the shape of trees, and its leaves, height and how we can identify them. This will be followed by a spot of tree identification around Mudchute’s Education Centre.

18. Mudchute Education Project GUIDANCE NOTES FOR SCHOOL GROUPS USING THE MUDCHUTE Moving Around the Site • Use the site map to help guide your group around the park. For groups that have not booked a classroom, the public toilets, café, picnic tables and main offices are located in the Stable Building. For groups that have booked a classroom, the facilities are located at the Living Classroom Farm Courtyard.  • There are pathways around the site to allow access to the animals and plants. The development of the Mudchute is on-going, so at many times there may be building works which restrict access to certain parts of the park.  Clothing and Equipment • Old clothing is best, as the park can become muddy in Winter and dusty in the Summer. • If you have booked a specific activity all resources and equipment will be provided. • If you are using the park independently, then the following would be useful:- • clipboards, paper and pencils, a camera and tape recorder. 

19. Mudchute Education Project GUIDANCE NOTES FOR SCHOOL GROUPS USING THE MUDCHUTE Safety and Responsibilities •      Ensure an appropriate staff/pupil ratio •      Be aware of the need to maintain control over your group whilst working in a public park •      Discourage the children from picking plants and flowers. Encourage recording of observations by sketching, photographs and tape recordings. •      Brief the children on the need to remain calm and gentle around the animals and to be particularly careful when visiting the horses. •      Only feed the animals with prior permission •      Collect all litter and dispose of in the bins provided. •      Ensure that hands are washed before eating, especially following contact with the animals or pond water. •      In case of emergency, telephones are located in the Main Office and at the Children’s Centre. •      A First Aid kit is located in the Living Classroom, Main Office building and in the café. 

20. Membership Details • The link teacher is an interested member of staff, who can liaise between the Mudchute. • Please return completed forms to Denise Lara , Education Officer, Mudchute Park & Farm, Pier Street, Isle of Dogs, London E.14 3HP or e.mail: denise@mudchute.org I would like to enrol our school/group as a member of the Mudchute Education Project.  I enclosed a cheque for £150.00 made payable to the Mudchute Park & Farm to cover one years membership. Name ____________________________________________________  Position __________________________________________________  School/Group ______________________________________________  Address ___________________________________________________  __________________________________________________________  ______________________________Post Code ____________________  Telephone __________________________________________________   Head Teacher _______________________________________________   Link Teacher ________________________________________________  Signed _____________________________________________________ Date ______________________________________________________

21. Outreach workshops • Touch it—Feel It: What the workshop involves: The day begins with an introduction to the workshop. The children join in activities exploring their sense of touch: A collection of materials found naturally at Mudchute plus a range of small animals and the royal pythons. The group will try to identify the minibeasts with the use of keys and books. History of wool: The group look how wool was processed during times past and how it is done today. The group will be encouraged to discuss the properties of wool and therefore why it is used. • Animals, animals, animals: What the workshop involves: This workshop is available to schools that can not travel to the Mudchute. A wide range of animals are used: small animals, baby animals and the royal pythons. The children join in activities exploring their sense of touch and smell. • Bread and Butter making: What the workshop involves: The day begins with an introduction to the workshop. This workshop can be altered depending upon the age range and ability of the group, but will include sections from the following areas. Bread and butter making and adding different ingredients to the butter and discussing the results. The group will be exploring their sense of taste, touch and smell.