Fire: How Might Children Benefit from Experiences with Fire
- A fire gathering has the potential to enhance a sense of belonging and community.
- Experiences with fire will enable links to learning in relation to Canada’s Indigenous history and contemporary Indigenous spiritual practices.
- For many children, lighting a fire and cooking in the outdoors is a new and rewarding experience.
- Lighting a fire with children provides an opportunity for them to directly experience and gain knowledge about the nature of an open flame within a safe and controlled environment.
- Lighting a fire with children provides them with an opportunity to develop a healthy respect for fire and the necessary skills to keep themselves safe around fire.
Kelly Kettle
- A fast way to boil water using only a small amount of combustible material, such as twigs, dried grass, or pine cones. It works like a chimney. A fire is lit in the base and the hot flames travel up the chimney. Water is stored within the walls of the chimney. As the chimney gets hot, so does the water. Great for tea and hot chocolate.
- https://www.getoutwiththekids.co.uk/camping/camping-tips/kelly-kettle/
The FNP aims to ensure that all people participating in sessions with fire will do so safely and with minimal risk.
- Leaders will explain to participants the importance of using only dead wood for fires and also of the importance of dead wood as a habitat
- Fires will only be lit in suitable defined space, a fire pit or wok
- Participants will only be allowed to light fires under direct supervision of a trained leader using suitable materials and equipment
- All participants will be given clear guidelines about how to behave and move around the area when the fire or kettle is lit
- A lit fire will be supervised by an adult at all times, as will all cooking activities
- Related safety equipment, including heat-proof gloves, a fire blanket, a burns kit and water/dirt will be kept within close range of fires
- All fires will be fully extinguished and all traces removed at the end of a session, except where the Arboretum has agreed that a designated fire pit may be used repeatedly
