1st Edition

Forest Schools The Research Evidence

Edited By Mark Brundrett, Elizabeth Malone, Avril Rowley Copyright 2025
238 Pages
by Routledge

238 Pages
by Routledge

238 Pages
by Routledge

Interest in Forest Schools has seen a phenomenal rise in recent years in many countries around the globe with thousands of children now experiencing this new context for learning. Forest Schools have also provided a new focus for researchers wishing to find out more about the opportunities and benefits that can be derived from this specific form of outdoor learning. This text brings together a... Read more

Introduction
Mark Brundrett, Elizabeth Malone and Avril Rowley

Section A: The Forest School in theory and practice

1. The Forest School impact on children: reviewing two decades of research

Ziad F. Dabaja

 

2. Reviewing two decades of research on the Forest School impact on children: the sequel

Ziad F. Dabaja

 

3. Does engagement in Forest School influence perceptions of risk, held by children, their parents, and their school staff?

Alice Savery, Tim Cain, Jo Garner, Tracy Jones, Emily Kynaston, Kirsten Mould, Laura Nicholson, Sophie Proctor, Rosanne Pugh, Emma Rickard and Deborah Wilson

 

4. Fostering children’s relationship with nature: exploring the potential of Forest School

Michelle A. Smith, Ally Dunhill and Graham W. Scott

 

5. Sometimes there are rules about what girls can do’: a rights-based exploration of primary-aged children’s constructions of gender in Forest School

Shirin Hine

 

6. Encounters with Forest School and Foucault: a risky business?

Trisha Maynard

 

Section B: UK perspectives on Forest Schools

 

7. Learning outdoors: the Forest School approach

Liz O'Brien

 

8. The place of forest school within English primary schools: senior leader perspectives

Nicola Kemp and Alan Pagden

 

9. Practitioners’ perspectives on children’s engagement in Forest School

Frances Harris

 

10. Challenges and pedagogical conflicts for teacher-Forest School leaders implementing Forest School within the UK primary curriculum

Victoria A. Whincup, Linda J. Allin and Joanna M.H. Greer

 

11. Footprints in the woods: ‘tracking’ a nursery child through a Forest School session

Melanie Mackinder

 

SECTION C: International perspectives on Forest Schools

 

12. Forest School in an inner city? Making the impossible possible

Heather Elliott

 

13. A bird’s eye view: comparing young children’s play in Forest School in England with Forest Kindergarten in Denmark

Melanie Mackinder

 

14. ‘Wow! Is that a birch leaf? In the picture it looked totally different’: a pragmatist perspective on deep learning in Norwegian ‘uteskole’

Øystein Winje and Knut Løndal

 

15. A balancing act: a constructivist perspective of the adult’s role in Forest School in England and Forest Kindergarten in Denmark

Melanie Mackinder

 

16 The importance of recognising and promoting independence in young children: the role of the environment and the Danish Forest School approach

Anna Cerino

 

 

 

 

Biography

Mark Brundrett is Professor Emeritus at Liverpool John Moores University, UK, and Executive Editor of Education 3–13, International Journal of Primary, Elementary and Early Years Education.

Elizabeth Malone is Reader in Education, Pedagogy and Citizenship, Manchester at Metropolitan University, UK, and Editor of Education 3–13, International Journal of Primary, Elementary and Early Years Education.

Avril Rowley is Senior Lecturer in Primary Education at Liverpool John Moores University, UK.