What Is The Importance Of Forest School?

Today, I shall be addressing the importance of Forest School.

It’s something you may have been thinking about or pondered, it may even be something you have never even given much thought to before.

But really, what is the importance of Forest School?

To answer that, at this moment in time, and there may be one or two more however, I really think there are three strands; Physical, Mental and Social.

Now it’s important to add in here thinking about Forest Schools holistic approach that none of these strands occur in isolation.

They are influenced and impressed upon by the others, a sort of really helpful peer pressure.

Let’s explore each in turn.

Physical:

You may immediately think, when i say this, of running, jumping, climbing and all that good stuff and that is absolutely spot. These are hugely important in our modern society with decreased activity levels in today’s children.

The best bit is they don’t actually know they’re keeping fit.

The terrain offered at Forest school is also an incredibly effective challenge as it is unpredictable, undulating and at times problem creating for example when a fallen tree blocks a route through a child wishes to take.

This tests balance, co-ordination, pro-prioception which is knowing where your body and limbs are in space and time, agility, and problem resolution amongst many other things.

As always we’re talking about much more than simply, in this case at least, getting the heart beating.

Forest School takes place in a woodland ideally on a regular basis and throughout the seasons in a long term process.

What this allows for is the encompassing of all the seasons and being outside. These are both physically amazing because it allows for more oxygen uptake which we all know is vitally important.

As without oxygen you tend to find a mild case of death follows, but more instrumentally for optimal brain development.

Now, interestingly even though children tend to go out more in summer as apposed to winter evidence suggests that due to oxygen pressure differential there is infact more oxygen available in the air during winter than summer.

I spoke more about the benefits of being outdoors in winter back at the end of last year in a Facebook Live that I shall link below.

The importance of seasonal exposure doesn’t stop there, as venturing out acclimatises the body to the world around them at different times of the year allowing their body to adapt and learn how to keep itself at the optimal temperature which is about keeping your body not to hot and not to cold, but just right.

Venturing outside in all seasons also exposes our children to Vitamin D from the suns rays all year round and different antigens which are things your bodys immune system is likely to fight and therefore make you stronger.

Here we’re talking about things like pollen and the yearly bug going round, even those present in mud and dirt which are helpful to keep the immune system primed and ready for action.

Remember all our bodies are innately intelligent they know how to deal with stuff without outside poking, prodding and pill consumption.

It’s all about optimally priming the body through nutrition, exercise and nervous system checks.

Indeed mud has been shown to be home to millions of feel good chemicals. Mycobacterium vaccae stimulate nerves to release serotonin in our brains. Serotonin is the chemical responsible for making us feel happy and relaxed.

Mental:

The mental wealth gained through forest school is hard to refute which means deny.

As we touched on, not only does playing outdoors release serotonin but it lowers cortisol. What is cortisol?

Its the chemical we release when stressed and can cause inflammation in the body leading to all sort of dis-ease or as we know it disease.

By reducing cortisol it allows our bodies to return to homeostasis which simply is the body being in balance. None more so than our minds.

With increasing pressure, stress and speed of life, our children’s mental health has rightly come into focus and a chance to break this cycle at forest school can be a welcome relief for many children.

Also by giving the brain chance to reflect and process thoughts through play, allows the subconscious to activate and enrich our ideas and process.

The subconscious is possibly the most powerful area of the brain that literally never stops working. I mean this is where dreams come from! I’ll show you an example.

Have you ever been hurriedly doing something and then forgotten a key piece of information or an idea you had? What happens maybe a few days or weeks later when you relax? It comes to you right, that’s the same for children!

The subconscious is consistently working on that issue. The brain doesn’t like loose ends. It does however need time and chance to reflect. It’s why we dream, which can sometimes be so vivid. That is our brain processing what it needs to.

Again the body is innately intelligent.

On top of this the nature of learning at forest school being child led and expertly helped by the Forest School leader initiates creativity and problem solving due to open ended-ness of both items within nature and the unstructured nature of play.

This also offers children the chance to follow their learning drives and become self motivated, engaged and engrossed by their learning.

This can build feelings of self competence, empowerment and respect alongside all those amazing intra personal skills that can be developed through a child’s play ideas.

Those key skills that are from within. Promotion of both emotional intelligence and self-esteem occurs through a range of strategies and approaches developed through Forest School in which the environment is a key tool in the whole ethos which looks to empower children and giving them responsibility in what can be an unsettling space.

Involving a child in the decision making process about their learning allows them to begin to feel self worth, independence, resilience, and thus can make significant decisions particularly in the company of peers. When children participate directly in their learning, they derive meaning, control and connectedness with the task at hand.

Meaning, implying doing something that one believes in and also that which has a greater purpose.

Control, implying that one is in apposition of making decisions, being heard and possessing relevant resources, knowledge or skills ensuring the task is completed to the end anticipated as well as to a predetermined level of self-­‐satisfaction.

Finally, connectedness implies that through working with others in teams , children achieve bonds with others and have a sense of belonging so forming positive relationship.

Finally social;

At Forest School things are done often in pairs or groups and children are given the opportunity to find out that more hands make light work.

Forest school goes a long way to develop a sense of belonging as a child shares new and exciting experiences with others such as campfires and cooperative group and team play.

Friendships develop and children help and support each other during outdoor learning which often yields different friendship groups to the indoor environment.

Sometimes learners who may suffer peer rejection indoors are recognised as having a new skill which increases their acceptance and they subsequently find it easier to make friends.

There is obviously the option for a child to play alone but often the chance to get hands on in a play activity with others is too good to pass up on.

Children are naturally social creatures and couple this with meeting some of their oldest ancestors; the trees… it’s a powerful and heady cocktail of social interaction, development, and group learning.

There is also opportunity through mixed age group play for language skills to develop and increase from communicating and passing instructional language to and from one another.

So that’s my take on the importance of Forest School.

You’re just one session away.

Link to Facebook live;
https://www.facebook.com/563785597125275/videos/547360252721330/