Schools
At Woodland Wakeup our directors have had over a decade of experience teaching in mainstream schools so we really understand the many varying and complex needs of schools, learners and communities.
We are very flexible in our approach and can tailor our outdoor programmes to suit the needs of individual schools, helping you to achieve your school improvement plans and local and national targets, invigorate your school STEM programme, boost your Health and Wellbeing curriculum and enhance your outdoor spaces and school engagement in nature play and learning.
Headteacher Feedback:
“Very flexible, meeting the aims of both the Woodland Wakeup project and our additional aim of developing our outdoor learning areas. “
“Children’s comments are always positive, even when it is pouring with rain! They have loved the project. ”
“Children involved have commented that a Monday (Woodland Wakeup day) is their favourite day of the week.”
Please see some of our potential (and adaptable) school projects below:
(The emojis are covering the kids’ faces in order to maintain their anonymity. While we understand and agree with this we are also sad to have to cover up their smiles and excited expressions!)
Nature Adventure / Forest School Sessions
Our Forest School / nature adventure sessions are super fun and can be undertaken with half classes or adapted for whole classes. Using the context of nature in or around your school grounds or a local green space, we can provide activities that will enrichen the creativity, independence, resilience and collaboration skills of your learners, while boosting their mental health and happiness.
Nature for nurture
We understand the healing power of nature and that engaging children with activities in the natural world can develop their resilience and ability to safely calculate risk. Our ‘Nature for Nurture’ programme uses the magic of nature with a bit of mindfulness and collaborative philosophical inquiry to support children with attachment issues and other social, emotional and behavioural difficulties. We can provide an early intervention strategy to help children develop skills to thrive, be at peace with themselves and make positive choices in their life.
Children thrive in the outdoors and spending time in nature can vastly improve physical, mental and emotional health. The natural world can nurture children with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties (SEBD) and those facing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) to develop resilience and overcome hardships.
Woodland Wakeup can provide sessions for nurture groups, children with SEBD or other vulnerable children to promote their nature-connectedness. Children that may have been disadvantaged in areas of their life begin to flourish as they have many opportunities to experience success: they develop self-esteem and confidence in their own abilities as they are encouraged to lead their own learning.
Working in line with Getting It Right For Every Child (GIRFEC) principles, meeting SHANARRI indicators and helping to achieve Curriculum for Excellence Health and Wellbeing outcomes, experienced Woodland Wakeup staff can support the meeting of individual children’s Staged Intervention targets and school improvement plan areas relating to outdoor play and learning.
“We can’t duplicate the therapeutic benefits of immersion in nature in any of our occupational therapy clinics. What children can achieve in a week (with unstructured nature play), we’ve been unable to facilitate in a year of traditional therapy.”
(Angela Hanscome, US-based occupational therapist).
PLAYGROUND PAMPER
Do you feel that your playround is lacking a bit of oomph?
Are you needing a bit of a boost with play facilities available for the kids?
Would you like to get groups of children involved in revamping their outdoor spaces?
Our ‘Playground Pamper’ project could be just what you need! We can help engage your school community to gather ‘loose parts’ items which could be used to transform some of your outdoor spaces and maximise playtimes.
Introducing kids to useful tools & developing the skills to use them both safely & proficiently. Building confidence & resilience, as well as nurturing things like patience, team building & self belief.
We can also get groups of kids involved in designing and creating natural spaces around the school, promoting a connection to the natural world (and the vast benefits that come with it), resilience, collaboration, communication and problem solving skills and any other particular areas in which you wish your pupils to develop.
We can teach the kids about soil science and the importance of quality topsoil for healthy ecosystems. We can get them setting up a wormery and/or compost areas to create lovely soil for your school community projects. We can facilitate the planting of evergreen and deciduous shrubs, trees and climbers in suitable areas and the development of wildflower meadow areas to promote the biodiversity of your outdoor spaces… and so much more!
Engaging kids in STEM subjects, we can teach them about safe tool use and to see the value in upcycling waste materials into cool stuff to explore! We can promote their sense of ownership of their school community by giving them the opportunity to create some amazing play facilities for all classes to enjoy.
SOIL SCIENCE
What is actually going on in the ground underneath our feet? What are the little superheroes in the soil that help things to grow? Can we create our own soil to grow things for our school community? In this project we can get the kids undertaking experiments to explore the soil. We can get them creating a school composting area in order to utilise food waste to create lovely new soil. And if you so choose they can create wormeries to explore the vital role that these tiny creatures play.
WORDY WIZARDS / NUMERACY NINJAS / STEM SUPERHEROES
Scottish Forestry recently stated that “…increasing the use of outdoor learning… will support cognitive and social development in primary schoolchildren, and help close the attainment gap in Scottish education.”
We couldn’t agree more! We love getting kids outside to spark their imaginations and creativity, to explore vocabulary, write amazing stories, or see STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Maths) in action. If Numeracy, Literacy or Science in your school could use a spark of nature’s magic, get in touch!
Download our “Make school a bit more cool” brochure here…
Download our “Nature for nurture” brochure here…
Whatever your school’s outdoor needs are, we are confident that we can deliver high-quality, tailored provision and support. We look forward to hearing from you!
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Woodland Wakeup Community Interest Company: Registered Company No. 606929
07932333044
14B Weston Terrace, West Kilbride, North Ayrshire, KA23 9JX
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