Where It Will Go

Original lesson metadata

code: EMP-BHTL-L1-T1-WK1
curriculum_id: a_bug_hotel
curriculum_name: A Bug Hotel
level_id: L1
level_name: All Ages
age_line: around 2 to around 6
term: 1
week: 1
title: Where It Will Go
blocks_this_week: 2
minutes_per_block: 25
weekly_minutes: 50
blocks: [{n: 1, title: Walking the Whole Outside, minutes: 25}, {n: 2, title: Putting the Marker Down, minutes: 25}]
domains: [UW, PSED, M]
objectives: [{domain: UW, text: Names one reason the chosen place is better than a place in full sun}, {domain: PSED, text: Stops and waits at each of the three places without touching the wall or the ground}, {domain: M, text: Shows with both hands how much ground the hotel will take up}]
materials: [chalk or two bricks or one heavy stone, one flat sheet of card to lay down as a size guide]
space: the whole outdoor area the school uses, however small, plus the corner that will hold the hotel
differentiation: {younger: carries the sheet of card with two hands and lays it flat where the group decides, older: says which of the three places has the most shade and how she can tell}
watching_for: whether a child can walk past a stick on the ground without picking it up
resources: []
version: 1.0
date: 2026-09-04
access: free

A BUG HOTEL · OUTDOOR LEARNING

ALL AGES · around 2 to around 6 · TERM 1, WEEK 1 · 2 × 25


DOMAINS: UW, PSED, M
CODE: EMP-BHTL-L1-T1-WK1
DAY & DATE:

Objectives

UW Names one reason the chosen place is better than a place in full sun.
PSED Stops and waits at each of the three places without touching the wall or the ground.
M Shows with both hands how much ground the hotel will take up.

Before you build

Choose the corner yourself before the session and keep it to yourself. You are going to walk three places with the children and let them choose between them, and you want the one you would have picked to be one of the three. That is not a trick. It is how you avoid twenty children voting for the middle of the space everybody runs through.

The place needs three things. It is against something solid, it is out of full sun for most of the day, and nobody walks through it. In almost every school that is one corner and you already know which corner it is. If your only outdoor space is concrete with no soil anywhere, that corner still works, and card 1 tells you what goes underneath.

Two children will ask whether the bugs are already there. They are asking whether the whole thing is going to work, which is a reasonable question at four, and the honest answer is that we do not know yet and we are going to find out. Say exactly that. Do not promise anything arriving, not this week and not in week ten, because you cannot make it happen and they will remember that you said it.

You will want to explain what a bug hotel is before you go outside. Do not. Walk first, choose the corner, put the marker down, and let the question arrive from them while they are standing in the place where it will be. The explanation is worth about four times as much delivered there.

Whatever you use as a marker, one child will move it to see whether it moves. Use something that survives that: a chalk line on the wall at adult head height, two bricks, a stone too heavy to shift casually. A stick pushed into the ground will be gone by next week and you will spend the first ten minutes of week 2 arguing about where the corner was.

How we work at the hotel

One adult stays with the group for the whole session. Sticks, bark and stones are carried with two hands, held low, one piece at a time, walking.
Hands are washed with soap after every session at the hotel, every time, whether a child handled materials or only watched.
Nothing living is ever touched, moved, picked up or poked, with a finger or with a stick. We look, and we leave it exactly where it is.
If anything appears that is not on a layer card, everyone stops, moves back one full step and touches nothing. The adult deals with it alone and the group carries on somewhere else.
The hotel is never taken apart to see inside. We look into the gaps that are already there.
Every piece used is bigger than a child's fist or longer than a child's hand. Anything smaller goes back on the ground.
Sticks with a broken point and bark with a split edge go back on the ground. We use the blunt pieces.
A child who does not want to touch anything stands with the group and looks. She is not asked a second time and she is not moved to the edge.

At the hotel

Walking the Whole Outside · 25 minutes

AIM: Walk the entire outdoor space once and stop still at three places that could hold the hotel.

Take the whole group and walk the boundary of your outdoor space, all of it, even the parts you never use. Walk slowly enough that the back of the line is still moving when you stop. At each of your three chosen places, stop, turn to face the group, and say nothing for a moment. Let them look at the corner before you ask anything about it.

At each stop, ask one question and only one: is the sun on this now. Put your own hand out flat and hold it there. The youngest children will copy the hand before they answer anything, which is the answer arriving in a body rather than in words. Move on before anyone has finished discussing it.

End the block at the third place, standing, without deciding. Walk back inside from there.

SAY: "Come with me. We are looking for a quiet corner. Hands behind your back while we walk."

Putting the Marker Down · 25 minutes

AIM: Choose one of the three and mark it so that it is still findable next week.

Go straight back out to the three places in the same order. This time say what each one has and what it does not: this one is shaded and people walk through it, this one is against the wall and nobody comes here, this one is sunny. Then ask for hands, one place at a time, and count them out loud.

Lay the sheet of card flat on the ground in the chosen corner and let the children stand around its edge. This is the footprint, and it is smaller than every one of them expects. Give the marker to the child who has said least all session and let her place it against the wall.

Before you go in, walk the group back to the door and turn round together to look at the corner from a distance. That is the view they will use every week to find it.

Say the thing here that you will say every week from now on, in your own words: if anything turns up that nobody expected, everybody stops where they are, steps back, and touches nothing, and you deal with it on your own.

SAY: "Look at the card on the ground. That is how big. Stand round the edge of it."

If you have more time

Walk the boundary a second time from the opposite direction, five minutes, and stop at the chosen corner from the other side so it is recognisable both ways.
Lay the card down in one of the rejected places for two minutes so the group can see the same footprint somewhere worse.

One thing for home

We chose the place for our bug hotel today and marked it. Ask your child which corner it is. If you are asked why this is worth doing: choosing a place and leaving it alone for ten weeks is the beginning of looking after something.

How you know it is working

A child walks straight to the corner without being led. Somebody asks what is going in it before you have said the word hotel.

Notes: