Welcome to Forest Rangers.

What is Forest Rangers?

Our Forest Ranger sessions take inspiration from a wide range of outdoor education activities and Forest School training. Our teacher, Mrs Leadley holds her Forest School Leader's qualification Level 3 and is Forest School first aid trained.

Forest School originated in Denmark as a method of teaching children within a wooded setting. Through exploration, play and child-lead activity your children will undertake learning and exploration opportunities in a non-formal environment, focusing on creative and linguistic expressions of their learning.  We are very lucky here at Blackwood as our school is set in the middle of woodland and provides access to several areas within the school site within which, our sessions take place.

Welcome to forest Rangers at Blackwood.

 This year we are offering our Monday afternoon sessions to our Year Four children. Each set of fifteen children aim to complete five sessions (within available timetabling.)

Our Forest Ranger sessions  work within a 'child-led' approach, each session may differ as our groups explore their interests and drive their skills and knowledge further.

Our students are instructed in ways of identifying challenges and hazards through their exploration and are taught safe ways of working as identified in our many risk assessments. A challenge or risk may differ according to the activity and be emotional or physical, from learning within an outdoor environment, coping with the weather, offering ideas to a group or using a saw, drill or cooking on a fire.

Scroll down to see what we've been up to or for ideas to try out at home and other outdoor spaces.

We hope you enjoy what you find.

Stay wild!

Mrs Leadley and Mrs Sandland.

Super saplings.

As part of our sustainability plan, we have been planting rowan and silver birch saplings. These have been generously provided by The Woodland Trust. We hope that in years to come, they will provide shade for our playground and habitats for many different types of fauna.

What will you be inspired with this week?

          Have you ever set yourself a challenge?

Have a go at some of these and see what you can achieve before you're 11 and 3/4.

Forest School is an important part of our curriculum giving Blackwood pupils a unique educational experience using the outdoor environment of the forest as a classroom. Forest School activities are arranged for primarily, Year Four children but can be extended to other year groups. We are lucky enough to have a fantastic eco-garden on our site which provides a contrasting habitat to enhance our studies. Forest School is led by Mrs Leadley, one of our own teachers and a qualified level 3 Forest School Leader.  Mrs Leadley is supported by our loyal volunteers, Mr Davies and Mrs Sandland and Miss Taylor.