Back Garden Camp Out: Avoiding Corona Boredom

So this is the first ‘working week’ of the working from home/social distancing measures we’re taking. Today is also the second morning my daughters are waking up in the tent in the garden! We’re lucky- we have ready access to a few tents of different sizes, as well as roll mats and camp beds, along with sleeping bags! But then, many families do!

On Saturday we pitched a bell tent in the back garden- it was a bit of overkill really- this things could sleep 10 of them!

That said, if you have a small 2 man tent, then that will suffice; or, even throw a tarpaulin/plastic sheet over the washing line and weigh it down with bricks (granted you need a night where there’s not much wind forecasted!).

We made sure they were wrapped up; wellies socks, slippers, onesie, dressing gown, woolly hat; then a camp bed with a blanket over- as well as half of their duvets side ways on, in two sleeping bags, with the other end of the duvet folded back on top! As well as their pillows! They were looking forward to it- and even asked if they could sleep in it on their own! Initially I was disappointed, but actually, they wanted this independence, and they were safe as our garden is totally secured- so I reluctantly slept in a nice warm bed!

We put the tent up at about 2pm in the afternoon, an from that point on they were outside virtually all the time. We’ve eaten meals out there, they have played in the tent, they are cleaning it and asked to sleep out for a second night! As I write this, it’s Monday morning- and they’ve slept out for the last two nights. Granted, this was a ‘school’ night- but this week their teacher is a little more relaxed, and this is going to be a tough time for them, so yeah- why not! We’re making sure they are in bed at a good time- and they are waking up having had a really good night’s sleep.

As it stands, they wanted to be there for the foreseeable future! With frosts forecast, and increasing wind, then they may come in for a few nights; but this is certainly a way to break the routine of spending every day at home!

For any families who don’t have a tent that would like to do this- then please get in touch- we have a few and can drop one round- this is a challenging time, so anything we can do to maintain a positive mindset is surely going to be a great thing!

If you want to get the most out of this experience in terms of teaching your children from home- then you can let them figure out how to put the tent up- this is problem solving and is a numeracy/maths skill; likewise, getting them to write a set of instructions to somebody about how to put the tent up is also English, handwriting, and numeracy- as it is a setting a sequential order to a series of tasks! An added bonus is that it gives them something to write about, and it is their experience- so a real world experience with a real application. And, it’s school work in disguise!

You could couple this with a breakfast of tin cakes which featured in yesterday’s blog post; and you can write about it your Spring Journal that we made a few days ago; indeed, that’s what the girls will be doing as part of their school work!