With the Covid-19 pandemic having had a huge effect on children’s mental health you, as a teacher, know how important it is to consider the approaches you can take to support the children’s mental health and wellbeing, and to provide them with tools and skills to enable them to support their own wellbeing too.
Programmes such as the My School, My Planet, run by Learning through Landscapes, help to highlight how spending time in outdoor environments has been found to help with mental health and wellbeing. It also demonstrates how “outdoor learning is a brilliant way to help children get back into an educational setting after so much time away from the classroom and staring at screens”, as stated by Ros Kerlake, Chief Executive, National Lottery Heritage Fund.
WEN member Felicity Robinson, Founder of Landscapes Naturally, has worked on numerous projects with the national school grounds charity Learning through Landscapes, sharing her expertise and skills. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic she has worked with both teachers and children, supporting them to use the outdoors as a unique and valuable space for learning: meeting curriculum targets while supporting mental health and wellbeing.
Felicity says: “Outdoors is a good place to learn for so many reasons, and there is much evidence of increased attainment and reduction in stress in children. There are many strategies that can help teachers to facilitate this.”
To support local teachers to achieve this, Felicity is currently offering a free Zoom consultation.
If your school would be interested in taking advantage of this offer, you can get in touch with Felicity to find out more via email: felicity@landscapesnaturally.co.uk