A South Wales school has been awarded £1,500 to set up an “outdoor classroom” for pupils in the school grounds.
Pontarddulais Comprehensive School will create a Forest School where woodlands will be used to bring learning to life by using new techniques to unlock children’s potential.
The cash was handed out to the school after it was successful in a bid to the Forest Education Initiative (FEI), which aims to promote the benefits of trees and wood products among young people.
A new Swansea FEI cluster group was established earlier this year and the grant means Pontarddulais will have one of the few Forest School sites based in a secondary school.
Teacher Rachel Tithcott said, “Our school motto is, ‘Live to learn, learn to live’ and we strive to enable young people to be motivated pupils and bring learning to life. Forest School can help us do this.”
It was one of 18 successful bids by cluster groups throughout Wales during the latest round of funding given by Forestry Commission Wales.
FEI is administered by FC Wales’s Woodlands for Learning team and brings together teachers, Forest School practitioners, timber industry representatives and environmental educators who appreciate the value of woodlands as a stimulating outdoor learning environment for everyone.
FEI was set up in Great Britain in 1992, with the first co-ordinator being appointed in Wales in 2000. Since then, no fewer than 23 FEI cluster groups have been established all over the country as the appreciation of the environmental, social and economic potential of trees, and of the link between the tree and everyday wood products, has spread.
The local cluster groups bring a variety of people together to develop and deliver woodland-based learning, including many teachers and educational practitioners who have trained to become Forest School Leaders.
The latest award of just under £30,000 in grants to help further develop Forest School in Wales will enable a total of 34 teachers to train as Forest School Leaders over the next year.
The grants will also provide funding for kit and support equipment to help set up new sites, so that the new Leaders will be able to put their skills into practice.
The Woodlands for Learning team’s Kim Burnham, who sat on the judging panel for this round of FEI grants, said, “The potential to use woodlands to enhance the formal education of our children is now firmly acknowledged and competition for the grants was fierce.
“The applications were of an extremely high standard and we’re confident these grants will help FEI cluster group members to develop exciting ideas to bring woodland learning to many more children and young people in Wales.”
The Woodlands for Learning team pumps around £30,000 every year into FEI in Wales and every pound is at least match funded, if not exceeded, by funds and resources from other sources.
As well as this special round of funding, there are three FEI funding rounds held throughout the year – in February, June and October.
