Forest school was adapted from
Sweden in the 1950's and has developed throughout other Scandinavian
countries. Forest school's only started
in Wales in 2000. Froebel , Montessori and McMillan are all believers of the
benefits of learning in the natural environment and insisted that children need
to play, to experience the space and to develop their skills. Forest school is
based outside and lets the children explore and experiment. Initially projects run from their own playing fields
allowing the children to become comfortable with an outdoor approach to
education and play whilst in familiar surroundings. It allows to base a relationship around trust and
self exploration. Once a group is established in the woodland and
routines are set up the project develops through a child led approach with
opportunities for projects being taken back to the indoor setting to be
continued.
Forest
school is learning that allows the environment to do teaching, which lets the
children explore and gain their confidence in a outside environment. It is a
different environment to the usual classroom setting where you can still learn
all of the national curriculum subjects in an unusual and inspiring
environment. Forest schools teach in a holistic way, all subjects get taught in
one, instead of them being separate. Forest school's philosophy is to encourage
and inspire the children, teach engaging and motivating tasks and to develop
the children's personal, social, health and emotional skills. The forest school
has a programme called The Seed-To-Tree Programme, this is a comprehensive six
step programme, where the children, teachers and local community all come
together and develop a community owned wild space project through the
development of local woodland. Every child that goes to the school plants a
tree, a legacy for the future.
The
six steps of The Seed-To-Tree Programme are Step 0-Nursery Nature Trail which
is an introduction step for the children in the nursery class, this introduces
the children to the importance of the woods and the nature, which gives them
time to explore and experience the outside environment. Step 1-Sowing Seeds,
which is for the reception class and year 1, which entails the children looking
for acorns, and 'test' them to find out which one has the best success rate for
growing. Step 2-Minding and Mulching, by
this time the children's trees have turned in to miniature trees, this step
focuses on how they look after the environment and growing things. Step
3-Global Kinship, this step gives them an understanding of the rainforest.
Step-4 Destination woodland, this is where the children are in their final year
and return to their trees and acorns. They listen to stories about global
warming an relate it to their trees. Step 5, the final step, Tree Rescue, this
is the emotional step where the children reflect on their journey through
forest school.
Forest
school teaches the children about personal exploration, learning self
motivation, self-esteem and confidence. It enables skills to be transferred and
developments to become well-known in to children's everyday lives. They do a
variety of activities with the children such as fires, cooking, healthy eating,
games, making rope bridges, learning about tools and practising skills and many
more.
references
Knight (2011) Forest School For
All, London: Sage
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