Enabling Environments: Collections - Farm out

Playing with collections of farm animals provides children with opportunities to cover all areas of the curriculum. Small worlds can be created with natural materials like bark, and children can use other resources like blocks to build enclosures for the animals to live in.

Some children may be interested in caring for the animals by feeding them with pieces of carrot or grain, or creating cosy places for them to sleep. Others may want to count and sort out the animals, placing mothers next to their offspring in size order. Some will enjoy acting out the role of a farmer, driving a toy tractor, wearing a worksuit and wellies and moving around real bales of hay. Either way, playing with farm animals can broaden children's understanding of the world around them.

CORE COLLECTION

A collection of farm animals should be a feature of your continuous (everyday) provision. Nikki Oldhams, headteacher at Chelwood Nursery in Lewisham, southeast London, says that providing a large collection of farm animals enables children to play out their fears and their understanding of nurture and care and relationships through small-world play.

She adds, 'As practitioners engage in conversations with children, they can introduce a range of vocabulary and help them to learn about sheep and lambs and pigs and piglets. They learn that animals have a family group. It's also a way of making them aware of where food comes from.'

When deciding which resources to include in your collection, Jo Vickers, manager at Weavers Fields Community Nursery in Tower Hamlets, east London, advises using farm animals that look realistic and are preferably from the same manufacturer.

She explains, 'This will ensure that the herd of cows is adults and babies, rather than an odd assortment of small adult cows mixed with larger adult cows. This would confuse the children into thinking some adults are babies, and that some cows are bigger than an elephant.'

Here are some points to consider when building up a core collection:

• Provide a large selection of farm animals, both adult and baby animals, so that children can share, match mothers with babies, or groups of the same animals, line them up or put them in herds. It is never enough to have a couple of cows, sheep and pigs as this will create frustration among children.

• Ensure that your collection includes realistic representations of farm animals. Try the Shleich Lamb, Lying, £2.75, or there's the Shleich Holstein Cow, £5.25, from www.tesco.com. Or, the Farm Life Collection, £24.95, which includes a Friesian Cow & Calf, Sheep, Lamb, Border Collie, Sow & Piglet, Donkey, Thoroughbred Mare & Foal, Billy Goat, from www.eduzone.co.uk.

• It is important to have lots of the same animals so that children can use them for grouping, sorting and comparison, which helps them to learn mathematical skills. Try the sets of Britain's Toy Farm animals from www.littlefarmers.co.uk, where you can buy six black and white Friesian calves for £3.99.

• Check that the animals are the right size for the farm buildings and vehicles to be used in small-world play, or provide open-ended materials that children can use to make their own enclosures.

• Ensure that some or all of the resources can be used indoors and out. Children will enjoy playing with the animals in sand and water and using them in real situations such as outside on the grass or in muddy areas.

SUPPORTING RESOURCES

It is important to have a range of resources that support the use of the farm animals. Provide artificial grass, a barn, stables and fencing so that the children can build their own small-world farms. Let the children add compost, pebbles, rocks, real grass, sticks and leaves to make the scene look realistic and set up the activity on different levels, on the floor, in a tuff tray, or on a table.

At Weavers Fields Community Nursery the children have access to real carrots, potatoes and onions, which can be cut up by the children to feed the animals. Water is also available indoors and out so that animals can be both fed and watered.

Jo Vickers says, 'Although we are based in the inner city, we are very focused on growth and new life, which is closely connected to life on the farm. We have three working farms close by and sometimes the children get the chance to feed the goats when we go on visits or the farm visits the local playing fields. It's very easy for us to discuss issues like where milk comes from and where our food comes from because we grow vegetables and watch birds nesting in our outdoor space.'

Here are some ideas for resources that support the use of the animals:

• Ready-made farmyards are an ideal starting point, particularly for younger children. For an open-ended resource try the Wooden Farm, £39.75, from Cosy Direct on 01332 370152. It is a 26-piece farmyard with stables, fences, a barn for machinery, a cart and farm animals. All the parts are interlocking and it nests away for easy storage. Or, there is the Complete Farm Play Set, £119, from www.reflectionsonlearning.co.uk, which includes a farm play mat showing fields, roads, fences and a pond; a wooden painted barnyard; a farmer, farmer's wife and a mechanic; and a set of 18 animal figurines.

• Offer children a selection of materials and wooden structures to make their own small-world farms. Create backdrops of green fields with the fake 1m Square Grass, £9.99, from Cosy Direct or the Landscape Box Farm, a set of handmade felt fields in a range of colours, £72 from www.mindstretchers.co.uk. Collect pieces of yellow and brown materials or felt for corn fields and muddy areas and let children separate off grazing areas for the animals with a set of four Wooden Fences, £12, from www.mindstretchers.co.uk.

• All farm animals will need somewhere to rest. Try using the Wicker Bridge, £6.85, from Cosy Direct, or the Bamboo Fencing, £5.25, which can be cut up to make self-standing fencing. Or let them build their own barns with the set of six Small World Fences with Bark on Top, £6.50, from Cosy Direct.

• Allow children to incorporate real raw materials into their play. Use Tuff Spot trays or earthy, muddy areas outdoors and encourage children to collect grass, bark or earth to use as pretend food or landscapes. Try the Dust Extracted Hay Sack, £5.89, from Cosy Direct, which is perfect bedding material for weary animals or the Live Moss, £8.95 or Raffia, £10.95, which are ideal for nest making (all from Cosy Direct).

• Tractors, farm vehicles and machinery will complete the small world. A selection of top brands like Breyer, Bruder, Siku and Britains are available at www.littlefarmers.co.uk.

• Large-scale role play in this area should not be overlooked. Provide opportunities for children to act out scenes that they may have had first-hand experience of. Provide dressing-up costumes like the Open Ended Workwear (Green), £14.95, made from tough canvas material. Offer them vehicles like the Sack Truck, £39.99, which is used for moving grain and feed or the Red Tractor with Trailer, with a bonnet that opens, £79.95. Or, let them haul around the Mini Straw Bales, £15 for 3, (50x25x30cm), all from Cosy Direct.

BOOK CORNER

Provide good-quality fiction and non-fiction books such as:

• Old Macdonald Farm Story Pack, £34.95, from www.eduzone.co.uk. This includes the Old Macdonald's Farm story book, six soft farmyard animals, a reference book from www.dk.com - Watch Me Grow, Farm Animals, a tape and a farm ludo game

• Farmer Duck, Martin Waddell (Walker Books)

• Oliver's Milkshake, Vivian French (Hodder, builds up familiarity with farmyard animals and their uses - cows for milk, hens for eggs and sheep for wool).

CASE STUDY

Children at Chalfont St Peter Montessori School in Buckinghamshire look forward to their annual visit to Willow's Farm, a children's farm in Hertfordshire. With a guide to accompany the them throughout the visit, the programme is designed specifically to meet the early learning goals. Jacqueline McCarthy, principal of the school, says, 'The children get to go on a tractor ride, watch sheep dogs herding ducks and to pet the animals. A guide is provided for the duration of the visit, which means that the children can ask whatever questions they want.

'They closed off the petting area for one of our children who is deaf and blind and turned off the music and lights to let her enjoy the sensory experience of petting each of the animals.

'This is the highlight of their year but the visit backs up what the children are learning about in the classroom, which is animal families and the chicken lifecycle.'

www.willowsfarmvillage.com.