Nursery World - Your outdoor calendar: May

Activities and tasks to help get your children outside this month. By Julie Mountain

ACTIVITY

ELDERFLOWER CORDIAL

The elder is one of the most valuable plants to have in an early years garden. It provides abundant, fragrant flowers in spring, nutritious berries for birds in autumn and nesting places for them year round, plus the branches can be used in many craft activities. It has many mythical stories associated with it and is fast-growing, so even if you harvest lots of branches for play, the elder will happily bounce back the following year.

Making your own elderflower cordial is not difficult and provides a superb STEM opportunity for young children – although be aware that some stages of this process are for children to observe rather than do themselves. I use the BBC Good Food recipe, but there are many versions online.

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