After volunteering at St George Community Centre’s play group for five years and attending our My Wild Child sessions, Faye Jackson has set up her own Wild Tots group!

Knowing the huge benefits of being outside in nature, and having always enjoyed working with children, she approached the community centre with her idea and was fully supported to use their resources.

They also suggested she contact ourselves at Avon Wildlife Trust, who are supported by players of People’s Postcode Lottery to provide outdoor learning opportunities for children and families in and around Bristol through My Wild Child, Wildlife Watch and Young Volunteer sessions.

Together with help from players of People’s Postcode Lottery, we were able to help Faye with some start up funding, enabling her to create activities aimed at inspiring 2 to 5 years olds to connect with the nature on their doorstep. We also supported Faye by offering a free pack of resources to help with session ideas.

Faye’s group began in April 2021, as lockdown was easing, with 10 families attending. Now, she’s able to facilitate up to 20 families and sessions usually sell out in an hour! St George Community Centre have continued to be a great support to her, helping to spread the word through their website.

Faye usually centres the activities around a book that she reads at the start of the session, such as the fabulous ‘We’re going on a bear hunt’ by Michael Rosen, sparking off bear-related activities and the joys of all the nature featured in the book. She’s also gotten inspiration from parents who attend the group regularly, friends who are teachers, and her own children!

One of the wonderful things about Wild Tots sessions is that it keeps children transfixed. It’s hard to get bored outdoors when a simple stick can be so many things – a wand, a sword or even a magic flying machine!

It’s also a tonic for the parents, not only getting to see their children experiencing the same pleasure from nature that they get, but also socialising with likeminded parents in a beautiful outdoor setting.

If you’d like to attend Faye’s group, she posts the details on the Facebook page for St George’s Community Centre play group, ‘Time for Tots’, as well as on the community centre’s website.

Our Wildlife Watch clubs are perfect for budding explorers aged 5 – 10 years. There is a Wildlife Watch Club at our Grow Wilder site in North Bristol and in Eastville Park in East Bristol. 

We also have Young Volunteer sessions for 14 – 24 year olds who want to get stuck in with some wildlife identification and practical conservation, enjoy some free food and meet other passionate young people.

Give your child a wilder future by becoming a member today

Thank you to the amazing #PostcodeLotteryPeople for
helping us to keep up our work connecting children to nature.