It is my second day of placement and today I am very much looking forward to the session. Today we are making Bacon Rolls on the campfire.

The girls immediately ran to a den they had been working on. The older boys were creating obstacle courses and the younger boys continued on from last week with their imaginative play. One of the younger boys stuck closely to Chris and I for the majority of the session. We were encouraging him to play with the other children, but instead he climbed trees on his own, or came to us. We then regathered as a group and one of the boys delegated tasks to the others to set up a campfire in order to cook the bacon. All the children interacted with each other and had role to play in a part of the process. I noticed the girls remain relatively quiet unless they are interacting with each other.

After the campfire I asked for the girls to show me their den. They brought me over to their den and they began to play their own game. They began pretending they were animals gathering food for their young and they used the den as a base camp. I observed their play, however as the game went on, I felt i was interrupting their, so  I went back to base camp. The first week I had not seen them play together, through play it seemed they were able to communicate through the game, which enabled more comfortable interactions afterwards.

In the second session there were only two boys this week. These two were the quieter of the boys. They asked how our week was and showed more of an interest this week, I felt more comfortable to be myself. One of the boys is relatively little for his age. According to the teaching assistants all he eats is chips. The other boy continued to comment of this boys size, joking around, giggling and making some inappropriate remarks to each other. We were just making tea and carving the start of a mallet. Both boys actively participated and continued to joke around with each other, however the teaching assistants were sat in between.

I really enjoy the second sessions. The boys who naturally find it difficult to stay still and listen are being given the opportunity to be creative and to do things with their hands as opposed to writing down all the time. They are given space to to be able to form friendships and good relationships with their peers and teaching assistants.

The two different classes have very different dynamics, I am so intrigued by the way in which two groups interact with each other so differently and am looking forward to looking deeper into the friendships being formed in these sessions.