Family-friendly Tree Inspiration
Resources from the Horniman Museum and Gardens
The wonderful Horniman Museum and Gardens in south London have provided a whole forest of brilliant tree-related resources to keep the kids entertained.
Podcast: ‘A tree walk around the Horniman Gardens’
Age range 8+
Rich Church, Gardens Keeper, and Jo Hatton, Keeper of Natural History at the Horniman Museum and Gardens, take a walk around the Horniman's Gardens to highlight some of their favourite trees.
The Horniman Gardens stretch out over 16 acres and are home to a varied collection of trees, both native and non-native. Some of the trees existed before the Museum as field boundary markers, or originated in the gardens of the Victorian houses that were pulled down in the 20th century. Our current tree-planting programme includes rare and endangered trees. The Wollemi Pine in the Prehistoric Garden and a recently planted Sapphire Dragon Tree are both critically endangered species.
Rich takes us on an early morning walk around the Gardens, describing some of the beautiful features of the trees on the walk, literally transporting listeners right next to him beneath the trees canopies. Interspersed with Rich’s recording of his walk, Jo and Rich discuss the importance of the various trees to wildlife. As well as being beautiful specimens, all of the trees provide food, shelter and nesting sites for a wide range of insects, birds and small mammals.
Locations of all the trees featured in the podcast can be found on this Google map.
Whilst the Museum is currently closed, our Gardens remain open from 8am - 4.30pm. We want to encourage listeners to discover and explore all the trees featured in this podcast but ask everyone to follow the Government’s social distancing guidance when visiting the Gardens
A Giant Redwood in the Horniman Museum and Gardens
Tree Folklore: A Family Trail in the Horniman Gardens
Age range 3+
Download a copy of our family friendly trail to discover the mysteries, myths and magic of some of the trees in our Gardens
Whilst we want to encourage families to continue to use our Gardens as a source of inspiration and relaxation, we would advise that at present you only visit if you live locally and can easily walk here.
Exact locations for all of the trees featured in the trail are available via this link.
World of Stories at the Horniman Museum and Gardens
Age range 5+
The King who wanted to touch the moon (14.52 mins)
People have told stories for as long as anyone can remember, for thousands and thousands of years. At the Horniman Museum and Gardens, our team of storytellers can whisk you away to faraway lands and introduce you to magical talking creatures. Before the Museum's current temporary closure, our popular World of Stories sessions ran every Sunday afternoon, and the tales were inspired by our collections and gardens.
At the minute, you might not be able to come to us to hear our fantastic storytellers but we can do the next best thing and bring the stories to you. Here are a few stories from one of our regular storytellers, Margaret Bateson-Hill.
Margaret is a storyteller and children’s author based in south-east London. She has been a storyteller at the Horniman Museum and Gardens since the mid-nineties. She participates regularly in the Museum’s popular Busy Bees programme for under-5s and the World of Stories sessions aimed at older children and adults.
Nature Notebook – Horniman Museum and Gardens
Age range 3+
Create your very own Nature Notebook to explore the great outdoors. Download our set of instructions and front cover then use them to make your own notebook to record all your exciting discoveries.
