Welcome to our new website. We are still in the process of uploading some content, so if there is any information you cannot find, please do not hesitate to call and ask us to send this to you directly.
Welcome to our new website. We are still in the process of uploading some content, so if there is any information you cannot find, please do not hesitate to call and ask us to send this to you directly.
Linton Primary School

Forest School

Our Forest School

Forest School is a key element of what we offer at Linton Primary. It operates full time and is led by a highly qualified Forest School Leader/Teaching Assistant who has extensive experience and training in supporting children with additional social, emotional and mental health needs.

Many of our children cannot manage to stay regulated and be ready to learn if inside the building for 5 full days each week so... we do not ask them to.

Depending on the needs of each individual child, their weekly timetable is adapted to be a mix of classroom based learning and Forest School sessions. The Forest School sessions enable the child to develop their skills in emotional regulation, emotional literacy, resiliance, and working with others. Equipping them with these skills then enables their success inside the school building.

What is Forest School?

Forest School is a child-centred, inspirational learning process that offers opportunities for holistic growth. It is a long-term program that supports play, exploration and supported risk taking. It develops confidence and self-esteem through learner inspired, hands-on experiences in a natural setting.

Forest School has a developmental ethos shared by thousands of trained practitioners around the world, who are constantly developing their learning styles and skills to support new and imaginative learners. Its roots reach back to the open-air culture, friluftsliv, or free air life, seen as a way of life in Scandinavia where Forest School began. It arrived in the UK in 1993 and has grown from strength to strength since then.

The process helps children to develop socially, emotionally, spiritually, physically and intellectually. It creates a safe, non-judgemental nurturing environment for children to try stuff out and take risks. Forest School inspires a deep and meaningful connection to the world and an understanding of how a child fits within it. The approach to risk adopted means that learners constantly expand on their abilities by solving real-world issues, building self-belief and resilience. We believe that risk is more than just potential for physical harm, but a more holistic thing. There are risks in everything we do, and we grow by overcoming them. Forest School therefore, helps participants to become, healthy, resilient, creative and independent learners.

'Quality' Forest School is delivery which holds to all six key principles that shape and govern the Forest School ethos. There are many forms of outdoor education and all have enormous value, however, Forest School is unique in its reach, delivery and effect. These six principles are:

  1. Forest School is a long-term process of regular sessions, rather than one-off or infrequent visits; the cycle of planning, observation, adaptation and review links each session.

  2. Forest School takes place in a woodland or natural environment to support the development of a lifelong relationship between the learner and the natural world.

  3. Forest School uses a range of learner-centred processes to create a community for being, development and learning.

  4. Forest School aims to promote the holistic development of all involved, fostering resilient, confident, independent and creative learners.

  5. Forest School offers learners the opportunity to take supported risks appropriate to the environment and to themselves.

  6. Forest School is run by qualified Forest School practitioners, who continuously maintain and develop their professional practice.

It is only when we see the 6 principles working together do we truly see the value of Forest School.

Underpinning these principles are some positive core beliefs. These can be summarised as...

Learners are all:

• equal, unique and valuable
• competent to explore & discover
• entitled to experience appropriate risk and challenge
• entitled to choose, and to initiate and drive their own learning and development
• entitled to experience regular success
• entitled to develop positive relationships with themselves and other people
• entitled to develop a strong, positive relationship with their natural world