Structured around the 4 seasons, this guide to outdoor learning and activities is packed with kids games, crafts, and skills to encourage your young ones to get outdoors—come rain, shine, or snow. The Forest School ethos of nature-based play and learning encourages children to develop confidence, self-esteem, and emotional intelligence—and it’s exactly what’s needed in an era when childhood problems such as obesity and anxiety are on the rise. Building on the success of the bestselling Play the Forest School Way, here is a brilliant selection of brand-new games, crafts, and activities to get kids developing new skills and exploring the natural world all year round. Structured around the four seasons of the year, each chapter is full of step-by-step games and activities that harmonize with the weather and seasonal nature patterns, including nods to seasonal festivals such as Easter and Christmas. Activities include: Spring: Nettle Soup; Wood-cookie-Man; Earth Day Birthday Cake; Dandelion and Lime Tea Summer: Bark Masks; Blackberry Ink and Feather Quill Pens; Nature Watch; Animal Tag Autumn: Evergreen Paintbrush; Baked Apples; Den Building; Leaf Stitching Winter: Elf Carving; Compass Treasure Hunt; Charcoal Pencils; Animal Track Casts At Forest School, children return to the same location again and again, building a lasting connection with a specific part of the natural world. Each of the four seasonal chapters in A Year of Forest School includes a description of an extended session (combining active and quieter activities, plus an idea for foraging/cooking), capturing this key part of Forest School play and providing inspiration for parties, themed learning days, and outdoor adventures.

This book is a complete guide to Forest School provision and Nature Pedagogy and it examines the models, methods, worldviews and values that underpin teaching in nature. Cree and Robb show how a robust Nature Pedagogy can support learning, behaviour, and physical and emotional wellbeing, and, importantly, a deeper relationship with the natural world. They offer an overview of what a Forest School programme could look like through the year. The Essential Guide to Forest School and Nature Pedagogy provides ‘real-life’ examples from a variety of contexts, sample session plans and detailed guidance on using language, crafting and working with the natural world. This accessible resource guides readers along the Forest School path, covering topics such as: the history of nature education; our sensory system in nature; Forest School ethos and worldview and playing and crafting in the natural world. Guiding practitioners through planning for a programme, including taking care of a woodland site and preparing all the essential policies and procedures for working with groups and nature, this book is written by dedicated Forest School and nature education experts and is essential reading for settings, schools, youth groups, families and anyone working with children and young people.

Young children will be immersed in imaginative, messy play and crafts, while older ones can work on more complex activities like stone tool making and sourcing water. Whether in an organized setting, a group of friends or a family outing, the fun-filled games will build confidence, bonding and result in happy children. Entertaining anecdotes from the authors' own experience of surviving in the wild can be read aloud to children, bringing to life the thrilling reality of sleeping in a cave or savoring your first-ever foraged meal. Learn how to light a fire without matches, build a shelter to sleep in, cook on a fire, hunt for bugs and much more. From essential bushcraft basics and Stone Age survival skills to joyful outdoor play, this book is packed with ideas to bring children closer to nature and all its magical offerings.

Outdoor learning continues to play an essential role in early years education, and this new edition of a bestselling book explores how the Forest School approach can be easily and effectively incorporated into early years practice. Expanding on aspects of Forest School teaching, and drawing on new developments and policy changes within the field, this new edition also includes: - a new chapter on working with parents - greater coverage of the 0-2 age range - new case studies to aid learning - coverage of international approaches to Forest School Yet again Sara Knight delivers an inspirational text for all those working in or studying early years education and care. Sara Knight is an experienced early years educator and Senior Lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University. She is a trained Forest School practitioner and author of Forest Schools For All and Risk and Adventure in Early Years Outdoor Play (both published by SAGE).

It's time to rewild the child! This book of outdoor activities, crafts, nature information, and inspiration ties into the burgeoning interest in forest schools and "rewilding the child," with the aim of reconnecting children to nature and the outdoors. The book is divided by season, providing a year-round resource for families. While all crafts and activities are designed to be carried out outside, these are interspersed with factual pages about forest flora and fauna, which can be enjoyed at home or used as a field guide while out and about. A beautifully illustrated and informative title to spark children’s imagination and free-thinking. With forest school-themed crafts and activities for all seasons, outdoor exploration can be enjoyed twelve months of the year, always with something new to see.

A beautifully designed book full of creative ideas and fun activities to get your children outdoors, with a foreword by Chris Packham. Spending time outdoors and interacting with the elements gives our senses a host of stimuli that cannot be recreated indoors. Whether you're splashing in muddy puddles, making shelters, foraging blackberries, playing hide and seek or watching birds, experiencing the natural world reduces stress, makes us feel alive and lays critical foundations for a healthy developing brain. Learning with Nature is ideal for parents, teachers and youth workers looking to enrich children's learning through nature and teach them to enjoy and respect the great outdoors. Written by experienced Forest School practitioners, it is packed with more than 100 tried and tested games and activities suitable for groups of children aged between 3 and 16, which aim to help children develop key practical and social skills and gain a better awareness of the world. The book is well-organised and features step-by-step instructions, age guides, a list of resources needed, and invisible learning points. Explore, have fun, make things and learn about nature with this fantastic guide.

Everything you need to get started and succeed in a nature preschool or forest kindergarten.

The first and only guide to shinrin-yoku for the outdoor adventurer! With techniques tailored for hiking, mountain biking, paddling, climbing, trail-running, and cross-country skiing, this is the definitive guide to applying the healthy and rejuvenating practice of forest bathing to your favorite activities. Forest bathing techniques have been largely limited to use while walking and hiking, but now The Outdoor Adventurer’s Guide to Forest Bathing will guide mountain bikers, paddlers, trail-runners, cross-country skiers, and climbers as they reap the benefits of forest bathing while enjoying their favorite activities. With invitations tailored for each specific sport and stunning color photography throughout, this book will enhance the outdoor enthusiast’s love of the outdoors while improving their overall wellbeing. Inside you'll find: Sport-specific invitations to enhance the benefits and enjoyment of each activity Information on trail stewardship, Leave No Trace principles, and best practices while out on the trail, waterway, rock, or route Athlete testimonials from each sport’s most successful stars, highlighting their own experiences using mindfulness in the outdoors Sidebars discussing foraging techniques, mental and physical health benefits, neurodiversity, and many more topics The Outdoor Adventurer's Guide to Forest Bathing is the only book you'll need to get up, get out, and feel better!

The outdoor environment is now an integral part of many early years settings and schools, but is it being used to its full potential? Providing extensive, challenging and ever-changing outdoor play experiences is an essential and valuable aspect of early years education. This book offers comprehensive guidance on how the outdoor environment can be used to teach and challenge all children across a range of settings drawing on forest school practice. Following a month-by-month format, each chapter provides a selection of theme-related play experiences alongside planning and evaluations of how the ideas described were carried out, and reveals the impact that they had on the children. Including detailed information on the role of the adult, the environment, planning and using children’s interests to guide their learning and development, the book features: over 100 full-colour photographs to illustrate practice diary entries that reflect how the planning was delivered, what changes were made and how aspects of learning were recorded and assessed examples of practice as well as comprehensive resource lists and safety guidelines links to indoor play and opportunities at home. Written by a leading authority on forest school practice and full of practical ideas that can be adapted to suit individual children’s needs, this book aims to inspire practitioners to make the most of the outdoor environment throughout the year.