What is Forest School?

Forest School is an educational approach that was developed in the 1950's in Sweden and Denmark. Forest school programs are found all over the world and are exploding across the United States. In forest school, children spend time outdoors in local woodlands, county parks, prairies and/or any space that is wild and green! Children have the opportunity to learn in a natural environment on a regular basis. Forest school programs offer an emergent curriculum that is experiential, play based, place based, and inquiry based while spending time in the same natural spaces. Forest school is essentially a classroom without walls.  

Forest School Principles:

  • Takes place in a variety of spaces, including local forests, creeks, meadows, prairie grasses, natural playgrounds, and outdoor classrooms.

  • Is a long-term process of regular and repeated sessions in the same natural space.

  • Is rooted in building an on-going relationship to a place and on principles of place-based education.

  • Is rooted in and supports building engaged, healthy, vibrant, and diverse communities.

  • Aims to promote the holistic development of children and youth.

  • Views children and youth as competent and capable learners.

  • Supports children and youth with a supportive and knowledgeable educator to identify, co-manage, and navigate risk. Opportunities to experience risk are seen as an integral part of learning and healthy development.

  • Requires qualified Forest and Nature School practitioners who are rooted in and committed to FNS pedagogical theory and practical skills.

  • Requires that educators play the role of the facilitator rather than the expert.

  • Uses loose, natural materials to support open-ended experiences.

  • The process of learning is as valued as the outcome.

  • Requires that educators utilize emergent, experiential, inquiry-based, play-based, and place-based learning approaches.

What Happens at Forest School?

The happenings at forest school vary from season to season, day to day, and hour to hour! Activities also vary depending on the age of the children, community landscape, what the weather did the morning before class, how long the children have been together as a group, provocations set up by the forest school teachers, and most importantly, where the interests of the children lead the morning. You may see children collecting rocks, building dens, working with clay harvested from a creek bed, weaving with tree branches, balancing on logs, writing their names in mud (or snow), and painting stumps. Playful learning in a forest school environment means that all domains of the MN Early Childhood Indicators of Progress are met daily.

A sample daily routine:

  • Arrival, song and story, safety talks

  • Hike to base camp

  • Uninterrupted, child-directed free play and discovery

  • Gather to eat snack and storytelling

  • Hike out of camp

The Benefits of Forest School Field Trips

When children spend time outdoors, they develop a connection with the natural world. This reduces stress, improves self regulation and self concept, improves physical development, as well as makes children happier in general. By connecting children with nature, we help to create the next generation of environmental stewards. The benefits are endless!  

Potential benefits of participating in forest school:

  • Improved confidence, social skills, communication, motivation, and concentration;

  • Improved physical stamina, fine and gross motor skills;

  • Positive identity formation for individuals and communities;

  • Environmentally sustainable behaviors and ecological literacy;

  • Increased knowledge of the environment, increased frequency of visiting nature within families;

  • Healthy and safe risk-taking;

  • Improved creativity and resilience;

  • Improved academic achievement and self-regulation;

  • Reduced stress and increased patience, self-discipline, capacity for attention, and recovery from mental fatigue;

  • Improved higher level cognitive skills.

Who Will Participate in Forest School?

Forest school is offered as an option for our students as part of their regular preschool class for all preschoolers who meet certain criteria based on safety, child development, and availability. We look at children’s developmental level as well as their preschool schedule to determine our forest school attendance each day. All children opting to attend forest school are given a forest school schedule so that families know their scheduled forest school days each week. Our forest school program transports children with two teachers out to one of the Douglas County Parks to explore and play outdoors. Families whose student participates in forest school will pay a forest school tuition of $15 each month that is automatically withdrawn, along with your regular tuition payment, on the first of each month. We have a Forest School Scholarship fund for any family in need of financial help. We do not want finances to ever be a reason to opt out of forest school. Please contact butterflyhillnaturepreschool@gmail.com to inquire about the Forest School Scholarship.

 

Forest School