Forest School
'Forest school skilfully promotes pupils’ spiritual and moral development.
It does this through expertly planned and sequenced learning.'
Ofsted 2024
We are very lucky to have a forest school in our beautiful school ground, which was created and funded by Friends of School and the Lady Elizabeth Hastings Trust.
The ethos of Forest School is for children to instigate, test and maintain a curiosity in the world around them. It allows them to explore, be creative, learn about and preserve the natural world in a safe environment. At LEH, we strongly believe that every child has the right to play and learn in the outdoors and our forest school enables our children to learn in a beautiful setting
Since September 2023 we have continued to develop our Forest School Provision in partnership with Claire from The Nurture Reserve. We have developed a progressive curriculum of key skills focusing on six areas these include:
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Shelter Building
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Tool Work
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Fire/ Campfire Cooking
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Natural Creativity & Arts
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Mindfulness & Spirituality
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Flora & Fauna Identification
Whilst we are very aware of the Forest School ethos of following the children's interests and intentions, we are also keen to develop and progress their skills from year to year. With this in mind we spend time with the children observing and questioning in order to plan and extend their learning and skills.
Children will learn skills in reception that they can revisit and extend each year until year 6. Our Forest School also links in with our spirituality and we spend time connecting with the nature around us and learning valuable ways to calm and ground ourselves when needed. These techniques are proven to support children's mental and physical health both inside and outside of the classroom.
So far this year children have built teepees, miniature dens, cooked smores, designed and made Christmas decorations, used a range of tools including, hammers, bowsaws, knives and peelers. They have demonstrated perseverence, excellent communication skills, problem solving, conflict resolution and developed resilience.
