How Does Forest School Support Holistic Development?
Today, I want to address how Forest School supports holistic development.
A key principle of Forest school is to provide significant opportunities for a child to develop holistically.
Such an approach to child development and learning recognise the connected-ness of mind, body and spirit.
But what is holistic development?
Simply it’s a learning approach that sees the importance of developing the whole child and not just focusing on one area, making it perfect, then the next then the next.
More deeply a holistic approach aims to help pupils be the most that they can be which Abraham Maslow referred to as “self-actualization” and is concerned with the development of every person’s intellectual, emotional, social, physical, artistic, creative and spiritual potential by engaging children in the teaching and learning process.
Let’s imagine a child is a cake for a moment.
When you go about making a cake you locate and find the right ingredients to make it then you put them all together in a certain way to form a whole cake.
What would happen then if you were to locate and find just the right ingredients to make a cake but never put them together, but simply saw the ingredients as just that- The perfect things needed to make a cake?
This is the perfect visual for holistic development and the more common way we approach learning with children.
Holistic development is mixing all the ingredients children need together allowing it to blend, flow and work with the other parts to make a cake.
By not putting the ingredients together they become stand alone pieces that simply don’t inform the whole this could be seen as individual lessons.
Through focusing our attention on the connected-ness of a child’s mind, body and spirit we are embracing the real and authentic developmental opportunities regardless of children’s culture, socioeconomic background, gender or age.
So what does holistic development look like?
Let’s take a trip down memory lane and imagine you are back in your childhood; jumping in puddles, playing in the mud, building sandcastles, finding bugs, exploring, discovering how things work — all the fun stuff!
Well that is all holistic development opportunities that come under the umbrella of… You guessed it play!
Play is crucial for children’s learning and their optimal development as it contributes to the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being.
The sad thing is, play is often thought of as something extra you do when the important things in life are done like reading, maths etc.
But this is so untrue and I hope you were able to see this from my cake example.
A holistic approach supports intellectual, social and emotional development of the children.
Supporting children as they learn at their own pace is important for their early childhood development and we should encourage and take every opportunity to explore their interests in a comfortable, natural environment.
It would not be a far fetched assumption that Forest School is a complete Holistic development model.
It’s environment, it’s ethos and it’s goals are all deep rooted and interconnected within the holistic approach.
A Forest School leader even goes as far as using a specific pneumonic to recall the key holistic development areas for observation namely SPICES.
No not paprika or sage but social, physical, intellectual, communication, emotional and spiritual.
Research suggests that there are some key factors that are essential to Holistic development and in this instance to develop at Forest School.
First; children need to learn about themselves.
This involves learning self-respect and self-esteem.
Those with high self-esteem tend to be more resilient, more persistent in the face of difficulty and develop closer relationships.
Thus self-esteem appears to relate in some way to an individual’s personal and social well-being and also to what have been termed positive learning dispositions’ — those attitudes, values and habits towards learning such as courage, curiosity, confidence, playfulness, self-control and responsibility which, it is maintained, enable children to be ready, willing and able to engage profitably with learning.
In relation to Forest School a strong body of evidence exists to suggest self esteem and self respect is increased during a prolonged programme. This is provided during a programme through the facilitator setting and building upon small achievable task just within the children’s range allowing success to be achieved and a development of self worth.
Second; children need to learn about relationships.
In learning about their relationships with others, there is a focus on social “literacy” and emotional “literacy”. Basically the ability to read and speak the words of emotions and social situations.
A constructive relationship with other peers offers emotional and psychological support, friendship and promotes a sense of belonging.
Learners who have formed positive peer relationships record improved social and emotional skills. To succeed with Social Literacy it entails a variety of interpersonal skills that assist children and young people to properly regulate and control their action, thought and feelings to achieve social and personal objectives.
Interpersonal skills being those that allow us to make relationships with others and include listening and communication.
Social competency is achieved when an individual becomes capable of applying interpersonal skills such a communication and conflict resolution mechanisms in any given social context.
This entails the ability to recognise and interpret particular social cues precisely and learn how to respond appropriately to interpersonal challenges. The very nature of the risk and challenges presented in an outdoor environment provide rich opportunities for children to become both social and emotionally ‘literate’.
Forest School provides these opportunities by involving children in small group activities, which enhance their social competency, teambuilding skills and problem solving capabilities.
A child also enhances their social skills in collaborative play and it gives them opportunities of knowing their strengths and limitations, in addition to making them happy.
Third; children need to learn about resilience.
This entails overcoming difficulties, facing challenges and learning how to ensure long-term success.
For an individual to develop resilience, it is important to engage in tasks are meaningful, to have control and autonomy addition to feeling a sense of connection to one’s community.
These elements are adequately provided for through the development of the long term Forests Schools program.
A Forest Schools programme promotes character development by enhancing self-control and morality, in addition to nurturing caring and compassion to other people.
For development of these attributes to take place, a favourable environment that fosters nurturing of meaningful and supportive relationships with others, while empowering the children, as well as communicating expectations for positive behaviour is essential.
Fourth; children need to learn about aesthetics.
This encourages the student to see the beauty of what is around them and learn to have awe in life.
Research has found that children taking part in the Forest School initiatives from an early age feel a responsibility to look after their environment and the creatures that live there, which develops, as they develop through the school.
This is linked to aesthetic value, physical attraction and appeal of nature theory.
Contact with the natural environment occupies a surprisingly important place in a child’s emotional responsiveness and receptivity.
Indeed children feel both an ethical and spiritual relation to nature around keeping nature safe and respecting the environment.
It is important to remember above all that these factors are all highly interconnected and without one the others can not function optimally.
Indeed, although defined as key factors I suggest each are perhaps sectors in which to group similar traits of the holistic development SPICES model in.
Each has a purpose when observing a child as they provide an aid memoire in distinguishing areas for improvement.
Following initial identification, that sector can be explored and a plan of action formulated to develop the weak area with the support of the other, stronger, areas.
In relation to Forest School this would take place during the initial 6 week time frame where learners are observed for their Personal, Social and Emotional characteristics.
So there you go that’s is how Forest School supports holistic development.
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