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While wandering along the bank of my late father's dam, i listened to the sounds around me and decided to ask my daughter and niece how they thought fairies might dance.

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During my AT2, my artefact was a fern gully near my home. To me the area looks like the perfect home for fairies and I imagined fairies dancing to the sounds of birds singing. Over the weekend I spent some time at my late Dads property. The avenue of trees on the Dams bank reminded me a little of the fern gully. My daughter and niece just love to create dances and had just been visited by fairies at my mums place so it was really the perfect opportunity to engage the two of them in some movement outside. This activity reminded me a lot of Ruth Wilson's (2007) book around the importance of nature play and how nature play provides playful and stimulating environments.

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My Dancing with Fairies experience went better than expected. It was unplanned that my mum also have the fairies visit her house the same weekend I had thought of this activity so the excitement filtered through the day. My daughter and niece chatted excitedly about the fairies while we were sitting outside so I decided to ask them how they thought fairies might dance. Both children stood straight up and began to move their bodies along to the sounds of the trees blowing in the breeze and the variety of birds singing. Even after the activity had ended, both children continued their game of fairies, even collecting flowers and branches to decorate the back of my dad's place.

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I brought in some silver birch tap sticks i had made and a range of pebbles which I placed on a mat outside for the children to explore.

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When I brought in these resources, I was thinking about Pauline Oliveros' (2015) and how she spoke about how a range of different sounds can create music. I chose to provide the resources outdoors as that is where they are mostly found and also, they reminded me of the sounds of the on-country visit I took for AT2 and how many different sounds you hear outside.

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Providing the loose parts without provocation was an interesting experience to observe. My hope had been that the children create sounds with the materials. Some children did, tapping the sticks together. Others decided to use the pebbles to build with or transport to the sand to bury. There were even some children who decided to use the sticks as wands. Although my experience didn't go the way I had hoped it was so wonderful to watch the ideas and creativity of the children and how differently they all interacted with the materials

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A group of children were interested in some of the leaves that had fallen on the ground. We decided to use the leaves to create crowns which then turned into fairy crowns.

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With Autumn upon us, the ground is becoming littered with leaves that have fallen from their trees. Children are fascinated with natural items that they can pick up, feel, examine, and transport around (Wilson, 2007). For AT2, I pretended to search for fairies. I thought about what the fairies might wear, and I concluded they used the materials around them to create their clothes and accessories. The children's interest in collecting leaves gave me the idea of the fairy crowns.

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This experience was such a wonderful one. The children and I spent ages wandering the yard collecting a range of leaves. When I suggested we turn the leaves into crowns, there were many enthusiastic 'Yes' responses. I brought the experience indoors and sat with whoever wanted to create a crown. The children selected a few leaves and we stuck them to a strip of paper. Once finished I declared that they looked like 'fairy crowns.' Some children agreed excitedly and pranced around the room adorning their crown while others laughed and told me it was a leaf crown. I enjoyed the process of this experience and observing the children's eagerness to seek out the best leaves. Next time we could talk about other things we might make with items we find in nature.

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Oliveros, P.  (2015). The  Difference   between  Hearing  and
Listening  [Video].  TEDx  Conferences.
https://youtu.be/_QHfOuRrJB8.

Wilson,  R.  (2007).  Nature and Young Children: Encouraging
Creative Play and Learning in Natural Environments.
Routledge. Ch 1, pp 1-18. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/vu/detail.action?
docID=324894