It does not matter what anyone else thinks – it is what you feel is treasure. Maybe your treasure is finding money, finding love, finding peace or a magnetic fish! For us it’s the smile on the faces of our young people when they have achieved something they never thought they could!
With our last week before the half-term holiday’s we have been as always packing the week full of activities for our young people – giving them experiences, teaching them, supporting them, finding their spark!
- Carpentry
- Motorbikes
- Bowling
- Candle Making
- Cooking
- Virtual Reality
- Educational Trips
- Animals
- Vegetable gardening
- Cycling
- Money games
- Fossil hunting
- Cray Fishing
- Geocaching
- Writing, English, Maths
- Pat Testing
- Computers
- Arts & Crafts
- And Searching for treasure…
A little metal detecting this week – looking for treasure.
Geocaching is a great way to get outside, bit of fitness with walking and on the hunt for treasure.
Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called “geocaches” or “caches”, at specific locations marked by coordinates all over the world. Wikipedia
And when we find a fossil after hunting – it feels like we have found treasure.
or when we catch that elusive Cray Fish…
A different type of treasure now, money money money! Why is this an educational tool?, well lets see what have we been learning here; learning how to play with others, learning how to be a good sport when you land on that horrendous hotel, learning how to count, learning about the value of money.
Now for a little exercise… this young person said they were more tired from playing on this VR headset than doing a sport and we can see that, from all those moves being made!
A different type of sport now, Footgolf with a bit of maths thrown in!
Cycling is an awesome way to keep fit, its a sport you can do alone or with a group of friends.
Staying outside we carry on with keeping fit, having fun, being with friends, learning to play nicely together.
Over in Lowestoft we continue to keep busy getting the unit ready. Wallpapering, hanging pictures, making a unit for under the sink, making a foldable chair, making a spice rack and fixing door handles.
3 types of bikes now – visiting TTT Motorcycle Village in Sudbury to find our dream bike, to making a dirt bike over in Newmarket 1 – its just waiting its nice shiny new engine, to fixing a bicycle, but also learning about how the gears work.
Over in Newmarket 2 with the unit now ready for action, the Carpentry area is allowing young people to really get stuck in with some wood work.
Newmarket 1 is complete – gates are installed and signs are up (lots of them!).
Over to Ipswich now for some Candle Making
Did you know….While the Egyptians were using wicked candles in 3,000 B.C., the ancient Romans are generally credited with developing the wicked candle before that time by dipping rolled papyrus repeatedly in melted tallow or beeswax.
We have also been trying out working with Resin.
These young people have been getting creative too using sand.
Here we are creating art through technology and learning about human anatomy.
Reading, writing, English, Maths – no matter your age these are such important skills to learn. Our young people get the opportunity to do these at their own pace, in their chosen location, with their chosen methods – whether its pen or magnetics.
This young person is going to figure out how to put a computer back together.
Building a PC will actually save you money in the long run, because you will likely not need to replace or repair components as often as with a pre-built. When a component fails inside a PC you built, it is easier to identify because you are more familiar with each part.
But this week has definitely been more about being outside. This was a fun visit to the Owl Sanctuary.
Some different trips here: Jimmy’s Farm, a fairground, trying nettle tea, visiting a cathedral, looking at the timeline of moon landings, trying fig relish and goats cheese for the first time, with ginger beer (not sure that was liked much) and visiting West Stow blossoms.
Can you see me?
After a busy day in Lowestoft the young people were treated to a bit of Glow Bowling!
Over in cooking we have everything from no bake white chocolate & vanilla cheesecake, pizza to from scratch Chicken Korma curry.
We show our young people how to plan and prepare their food, from writing the recipe, to buying the ingredients. Seeing a task through with a tangible end product is a great way to boost your self-esteem.
Cooking can help you practice subjects like science, reading and math, and will increase your critical thinking. Cooking is great way to relieve stress, it allows you to be creative in a safe environment.
Catching magnetic fish….
What are they learning through this activity? They are learning muscle control as they hold and guide the fishing rods and try to match the magnet on the end to a letter or fish. Picking up the items with their fingers requires fine motor control.
A lovely sensory activity making slime and playing with shaving foam!
With one of our tutors a qualified Pat Tester – he was able to show one of our young people how it works – maybe a new career option to consider?…
Ooh shiny parts….If you like that sort of thing, personally I prefer shoes!, but I think our young people are more excited to get the MX5 project back up and running now the parts have been shot blasted and powder coated.
As we end this week and look forward to the half-term holidays we finish with a little music….
Our Ethos
No one can begin to affect the world around them until they are CONFIDENT , COMFORTABLE, happy in their own skin and have found their SPARK! We take the time to understand and develop programmes from where the learner is in the world not where we think they should be.