As I'm a qualified forest school leader, I was given the task, at short notice, of doing a session at school this afternoon.
A teacher had planned activities around a survival theme, with the whole school working together on various activities. I was called in and told to work with groups using potato peelers to whittle sticks to use for toasting marshmallows tomorrow.
It would have been great if I had the right sort of potato peelers, enough suitable sticks (or at least some loppers) and an adequate adult to child ratio for a forest school tool using session.
What I had was mixed age (3-9) groups of ten children, this type of peeler and no first aid kit in sight - it wasn't easy and I knew we wouldn't make it through the afternoon without someone peeling their finger, despite being taught the correct way to use the peeler.
The little guy pictured is a farmer so he whittled a perfect stick without any help - there were one or two that knew exactly what to do and even how to safely do it before I had even said a word. I have said no to doing any other activities this week - if they want me to do forest school sessions, I want to plan and lead them myself since I'm the one who knows what Forest School is actually about and how it should be done!
