What is Outdoor Learning?

Outdoor Learning is different to Forest School as this is where you use being outside to develop and enhance a lesson focused on the curriculum. Looking for patterns or shapes in a book compared to finding the shapes out in the real world helps build upon our learners understanding and fluency. Trying to describe or write a poem without being out and experiencing what it is you want to say won’t help improve our learners skills

 What is Forest School?

Forest School is more than just being outside and not in class. It is designed to use a regular session outdoors in a woodland and allowing through learner led activities to develop confidence, resilience, independence and creativity. It also allows for learners to feel safe enough to take more choices that could put them that can expose them to risk and feel comfortable with the feeling.

 What a Brooke Forest School session looks like?

For each session we will have a welcome circle moment, where we introduce the activity and have some sensory time out in the woodlands. There is then time to explore the area normally with a task such as a colour hunt, firewood collecting or a story trail. This allows the learner to explore at their own pace throughout the area.

During our sessions here at Brooke we use a scheme called Wild Passport. This provides 5 areas of Forest School to work with, Fire, Shelter, Nature, Rope and Woodcraft.  These activities are the main feature of Forest School. We will learn how to use the tools,  identify trees, tie knots, put up dens and shelters, lay fires and cook on them to name but a few of the activities.

Throughout the time at Forest school there are also a wide range of child led activities such as water play, weaving, minibeast hunts, reading books, number activities all aimed at developing skills from the classroom  and enhancing their time out in Forest School. 

Autumn Term 2024

During this term we will be exploring the areas with our senses and allowing new learners to Brooke to experience the Forest School in a safe and proper manner. Further up the school we will be focusing predominantly on knots, lashings, den building and a variety of different shelter structures. Throughout the sessions we will be looking into how the area changes over the autumn and winter months including types of trees, animals and weather will experience. We will also begin to reintroduce some of the tools and woodwork techniques. 

The Outdoor Learning site is within the school grounds in a small secure woodland area. Sessions are held weekly, throughout the year, therefore, experiencing all weathers and the changing season. Each session follows a routine, starting with a group activity and also including a drink and snack. Sessions are flexible enough to allow child led learning. Activities can be curriculum linked to most subjects;

Each year we try to give our learners different experiences that they wouldn't normally have easy and readily  access to. This includes our adventurous activity days. These are days where we we bring in activities that bring a little more risk and excitement along with them. These activities include rock climbing, archery and fencing. 

In early March we had a visit from Potato Pete from McCain's to introduce a new grow your own program. School was provided with all the potatoes and equipment needed to grow our own class potatoes. The classes and learners will be watering, looking after and harvesting the potatoes up until late June early July. Once harvesting is ready to commence McCain's will come back to school and complete some harvesting and cooking workshops where the learners will be cooking and eating their own home grown potatoes.