Who Is Forest School For?

Today I’m going to look at the question ‘Who is Forest School for?

Well this may turn out to be a short one as the answer is everyone. There you go, cheers for that. See you tomorrow.

Only kidding, but it truly is accessible for everyone no matter your age, gender, ethnicity, ability or disability!

As you may have noted throughout some of the other episodes and I will continue to preach this.

Forest School is led by the learner and what they do whilst at Forest School, usually through play can be as complex or a simple as they the learner wants it to be, meaning a variety of ages can play and learn together with little issue.

Remember play IS serious learning and it stretches even the most talented of minds.

I’ve said before that there is a reason why human beings are born knowing how to play, it’s that important to our survival and unique to each child.

It’s how we learn to live in a world that’s ever changing.

Only over the last 100 odd years has this weird stigma been attached to it, that somehow it’s not how children learn best.

‘Instead we must memorise! That’s the way to do it…’

Yeah, alright pal! There is a reason we’re not all in Mensa,… it doesn’t bloomin’ work.

The memory is amazing, yes, but it has a terrible flaw of letting us down when we need it most in pressure situation… I don’t know like an exam say.

It’s one muscle that needs training. When it becomes over trained it can lead to burn out like our bodies.

Children are no different.

More importantly when you remember things you are actually creating a brand new memory each time as your brain has to re construct it, which can lead to slight untruths creeping in.

But you are convinced because that’s how your brain has constructed it.

Try it out with a family member today and see if you remember a funny moment you both were part of, the same.

On the opposite side of this whole debacle is that play uses every muscle in the body, every sense in the body and the memory all in sync.

Yet again that key word holistically.

Everything is interconnected and to work with another.

It’s play that makes learners unafraid to fail, confident to try new things and do serious things better!

Scientifically backed research has concluded that learners synapses are built in a quicker time frame learning through play than today’s standard methods of learning.

In the world we now live and driven by high demands on learners lives, time at Forest School provides a therapeutic environment for everyone and can help in so many various ways, from easing symptoms of anxiety, to feeling included, to levelling the playing fields, to just being alone with your own thoughts.

To be is to live and Forest School is all about meeting someone where they are at no matter what they have or do not have.

There is no set expectation or goal to achieve.

A learner sets their own goals, which by the way we all automatically know what we need to do to reach our next learning steps.

You bring who you are and you’ll be made to feel special for being that person.

Everyone is unique and celebrated for that as part of Forest School.

By approaching it in this way the skills, knowledge and understanding that can be shared between people is phenomenal, even from learner to Forest Leader.

Everyone is consistently learning, co-constructing knowledge and reflecting on how they can improve for themselves and the group.

The common example is the underachiever in the classroom who becomes the overachiever at Forest School and goes on to help and inspire their classmates in that environment.

Nature has a way of connecting people on a deeper level and seeking out all our weaknesses in a non judgemental and quite subtle way, so that we become dependent on and depended upon by the group as we grow, learn, laugh, cry, question, inspire and provide for each other. In my opinion that’s what it truly means to be human.

It could be argued that this should be the basis of a society that is broken and on its knees.

Forest School re finds what it truly is to be human and builds within each child the knowledge, attitudes, skills, habits and drives to become a better person for the world and there fellow human beings.

You’re Just One Session Away…