Nursery World - Enabling Environments: Outdoors

The physical and mental benefits of a Forest School week for children at a South Shields setting have exceeded expectations.

The White Paper 'The Natural Choice: Securing the value of nature' and the National Trust report, 'Natural Childhood', both set out the need to strengthen people's connection with nature and give every child in England the chance to experience and learn about the natural environment. Rising to the challenge was Riverside Nursery, a local authority run setting within a children's centre near a large social housing estate in North Shields.

This riverside area of North Tyneside comes high on the list of deprived areas - 643 out of 32,482 in the Office for National Statistics' Indices of Deprivation - with many unemployed households and lone parent families. Despite being within 4km of an award-winning beach and park, some children had never explored these environments.

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