Ep 242 - Expectations VS Reality in 2026

Welcome to the Forest School podcast, a show where I, Lewis and my co-host, Wem Southerner,

set out to explore a shared pedagogy. It's a space where cerebral thinking matters more

than craptivities, where educational purpose outweighs pretty resources and where inclusion

is more than just a buzzword. Join us as we overthink the trivial, deep dive into whatever

spots are, don't me, and reflect on what it means to truly hold space for others,

holistically and without judgment. Thanks for being here, we hope you enjoyed this episode.

Bam, hello, we're in. Hi, one of my wildlife ambitions for many years has been to find or to

see a long-tailed tits nest. I never have, and I've thought I've probably never

will because they're like amazing. Do you know how they make them? Tell me more. They make them

out of spider's webs and liken, and they make it like a total, like a bag, a pouch. It's not

like a typical nest shape, it's like a sort of overly pouch, and then they lay the eggs,

they lay the babies, and they lay the babies, the babies hatch out, and then the babies grow,

and the nest stretches as the babies grow, like a pouch, like a plastic bag. Oh, like an external

kangaroo pouch. Yeah, yeah, and all of them, they're really social, and the aunties and the uncles

of every, you know, help feed the babies, they live in this like community, yeah. And I was in my

garden the other day deciding, right, 2020 was long ago when we were all like, let's grow vegetables,

in the garden, be self-sufficient. We did that for five minutes, and then now all my, like,

fetch beds are full of rumbles and nipples. Anyway, clear those out. Got a really spiky ugly shrub

that me and my husband have been arguing about. I've been like, right, I want to cut that shit

down because I don't like it's in the wrong place. He's like, why cut things down? I'm usually

in with him, but this one is just in the wrong place. Anyway, I went there with a saw ready to cut

this shrub down, and I was like, what the hell? There's an old longtail tits nest in this blooming

thorny shrub. Wow. And it's in my garden. Oh my god. Anyway, I was like, it's an old one because

it's like, had its roof ripped off and it's been predated by a woodpecker or something from that

last year. Okay. I looked it up, checked it in my book in my very special book Nests by Susan

or Gil V, which is just behind me, which is the most beautiful book of RT Nests. And I was like,

yeah, so I took it and I put it in my special little shelf stain where I've got nests. And then

I went down the garden a few days later and I saw a longtail tits and it looked at me like,

what are you up to? What are you doing? And I was like, oh my god. That's not an old nest. You

had been building that this year. No. And it started a new one in the same thorny shrub. And I was like,

oh no, you've had to start all over again. This is really bad. So I put the nest back near it,

thinking at least they can take the materials from this. Okay. Yeah. Which they have done. And now

they're nearly finished and they've got a roof on that. They've made the pouch and now they're on

the stage where they've collected but loads of feathers from all birds everywhere, all different

types of feathers. And they've put them just below the nest. One of them's bringing the feathers

and the other one is shoving all the feathers up into the nest in a hole in the bottom to make it

completely feather-lined. Like probably a double adult handful of feathers is how many they've

collected and they're shoving them up like that. Yeah. That's amazing. Wow. So yeah. Wow.

The ambition unlocks. Yeah. In the garden. Are you keeping it? How often are you peeping at?

Is it easy to go and pee pat or is it like? Yes, it is. You've got to give them some space.

I do both both of those things. Okay. And it's right near where we're going to try and

grow some carrots and stuff. So we won't be there that much now. But I'm sort of mindful to

go there a bit and look a bit and then give them space. And you know and I could be like,

do you remember we had the blackbirds in the woods at forest school where they would like nest

on the path. And I think it was something to do with not on the path like where you would step over

but at the edge of the path. And it felt like they were doing it because we keep away the pigeons

and the buzzards and they've kind of gone ace. Yes. This is it. That's what I thought. Yeah. And

any other predators, yes. Oh, well that's very joyful. So there you go. That's very joyful.

Happy spring. Hmm. I have had this week the joys of going and eating and getting wild garlic

and then on the way we store nettles and some of the kids were like, is it nettle time again Lewis?

And I was like, oh my god. Of course. It is nettle time again.

Well, there's a big tractor going past. Did you hear that? I did it. The big tractor going past.

It's all going on over there. So you've been eating the wild garlic?

Been eating the wild garlic, been eating the nettles, been doing all the things.

Oh, which I've needed. I've needed a bit more like

being outside is good after all that rain. Yeah. But yeah, grand, right. Should we get into today's

topic? Yes, please. That's the music that goes in. Put it in there.

Okay. So we are talking about sort of a mishmash, a few different bits. This one isn't it? We've

had just pieced together a few thoughts. But the prompt for this chat came because

you know, everybody is full of the joys of spring and full of the joys of like, let's get going.

Let's do the thing. And so it is the prime time of year for people to start advertising their

forest school leader training courses. And it's especially for the first week where it's sunny.

You get an advert on your algorithm. You go, I could do the outside job. I'm the one. And it'll

always be like this. And one particularly caught my eye because the kind of pitch of this advert

was about like saying, if you it was slightly like, I'm going to say the thing. It was slightly ML

MLME. It was slightly, if I was being really extreme, I would say maybe slightly predatory. But

the vibe of it was forest school. If you're going to do the forest school training with this person,

forest school is a thing that you can do around your own children that you can earn like unlimited,

basically like, earn unlimited amount of money, work around your own schedule, be your own boss,

babe. Like, you know, that kind of empowerment thing. And it struck me as something. These things

are always slightly jarring because whenever you're inside an industry and you see adverts for

people to draw, I'm sure this is true of like, this is true when I see like adverts for teaching

as well. Just broadly when it's like, why don't you help out? Why don't you get the joys of

teaching? And I look at it and I go, because I know what teaching is. And it's not a kid coming

up to you and going, thanks, Mr. Ames. I really was stuck on that maths question. And now you're my hero.

Bye, sir. And then they skip off off to the bus and you stand there in your smart casual

tweed and go, right, that's not what the reality is. But that's the adverts and it like,

teaching, make a difference. All the kids will love you. And there'll be no issues on your mental

health whatsoever. Facebook is full of groups of teachers on various forums. Look, I've seen the

new ad just like, ranting about it. Like they forgot to mention the blah, blah, blah, blah, you know,

yes. Yes, yes, yes. So you're basically saying that because I have seen similar adverts, but

I've seen one about like green prescribing and also about like jobs outdoors, not just for

schools, lots of life. Listen, everyone thinks you need to be like super, super specifically

skills to do these outdoor jobs with other humans. And you don't anyone can do it. You can do it.

No, no prior anything needed. Just sign up. Yeah. Online course to be a green prescribing outdoor

facilitator and things like that. So there's, there's obviously like, it's almost like they're

kind of pitching themselves as recruiting agencies for like outdoor stuff. And I'm sure it's such a

white thing. It's scientific courses that you can pay for to do it and stuff. So basically,

this is us being the old jaded teachers at the corner of the staff who roll their eyes at all the

new bouncy enthusiastic young people who've gone, I've just discovered this world and it's so

great. Well, it's not like you think it's bloody well, but it's going up for a fact.

Yeah, this is us being really, no, it's not, it's not going to be, it's not at all, it's not at all,

it's almost, it's, I don't want to say it's the opposite because I am, but I, you know,

I, I deliver four school leaders training, like I, you know, understand the thing, there's

something about the difference between saying, like you just said in that advert where it's like,

you don't need any qualifications to do this versus anyone can do this. And they're not quite

the same thing. And there's a differentiation in there, which is like very important, but it

benefits some people who just want numbers through the door. If you're running any sort of training

course where you just want numbers through the door, it benefits you to lean on their side of

anyone, you don't need any qualifications to do this, rather than highlighting the like,

yeah, any, you know, you don't need qualifications to do this. However, the job at the end is a very

vocational, very specific, you know, very whatever we're going to put in their job, but that's not

the bit that's going to get people through the door. If you just want to maximize your training

numbers, and so there's, there's something maybe that feels, like I say, if you're inside an

industry and you see people saying anybody could do this, like, well, yes, and no. You know,

that's the thing that I want to like explore because it's one of the reasons that I've moved

the training, and we, you know, we used to talk about when we were doing the training courses

together through having it over multiple seasons, not just because, you know, that's the better option

for long-term learning. You know, every study out there is like spread out learning is better than

short condensed kind of intensive stuff, but also a big part of the experience of particularly

this job is experiencing different weather situations, different like seasons, and it feels

less disingenuous. You know, if you could just, if you wanted to really miss sell it, you could run

really intensive forest school training or any kind of outdoor training, you know, bushcraft training,

and you only run it for two weeks in the middle of July and August every year, and you tell people

that you could all be bushcraft instructors, and it's always like this, where there's an

abundance of materials and an abundance of nice weather and all these things. That maybe think,

like, it depends what you think that the training's for, and I think of that in terms of the

facilitator and the P and the course attendees, like, do you think, not you, but does one think that

the training is there to prepare the person realistically for the job, to try to give them a

realistic sense of what this job entails, or is it there to be an environment in which new skills

can be learnt in an effective way, to enable somebody to be kind of fully, like equipped and skilled

and safe to do the job, which they then discover the realities of later, and I think you can probably

make the case for both of those approaches, and clearly no training is going to be able to cover

every single situation, every kind of element that, for a career might entail. So I can kind of see

it both ways, I can sort of see that there is a kind of joy in just doing your training in some

lush weather, where all the conditions are just optimal for you being chill, relaxed, receptive,

like your needs are being met, because it's quite easy to meet your needs on a lovely summer day,

you might have a wasp sting, but apart from that it's all good. And, you know, and then that being

a lovely thing. That opens up more bandwidth for the actual learning of maybe the skill. I can see,

I can see the other way around, because actually I can also see the other way around, I can see

that it's really useful to be able to be a participant in an outdoor session, which you

have to lead, you probably will have to lead in more challenging weather, more challenging conditions,

and to see how needs are met, or how much more challenging is to meet certain needs when it's like

really cold, or really muddy, or whatever. So yeah, I can see, I can see kind of both points of view,

but where was I going with this? Like, I guess, yeah, I guess I wanted to talk about kind of

not just the training, but things that I expected about for a school before I became

for a school leader, before I did my training, things that I thought I was like, well, yeah,

that's what it's going to be like, and that's what it's going to be, and then the realities,

and then what that might mean in terms of skills one might need, or practices one might need to adopt

as a human. So, like, for example, really, really basically, what I expected was an adult, me,

running activities with kids. That's what it was. I was like, that's what it is. I will plan

our read some books. I'll think about the seasons. I'll look at nature and see what it provides,

and then I will make an activity, and I'll do the activity with the children, and they'll do it,

and it'll be great. And then the reality, obviously, was like, yeah, some of that, like, like, I

really thought I was going to go in and do like drama based for a school. I thought I was going

to go in and go, well, I was going to do this drama exercise we're going to do outside, and now we're

going to make costumes out of natural materials, and then we're going to put on this play.

And of course, the reality is the spontaneity and the play, and the going off in millions of

different tangents, and then the skill set that you need for that, obviously being, being able to be

like way more flexible than in something like teaching, you know, or any kind of other work with

groups, I think. I've been interested to know, actually, if there is any other work with groups,

where you need to be the best one, I think that is because of the environment. There are so many

potential springboards, other stimuli that can intrude upon that activity that are not intrude,

but divert that activity and take it in a different direction, that it's just not like anything else

where you might have, you know, say, run a craft group with children of mixed ages, or run a,

you know, an after school club in a school hall, or something like that. I just think it's got

that potential to be just like, kaboom, square brain everywhere. And kaboom in so many different ways,

because I think you're right that I think that is also one of the expectations that I had was that

like it would be very top down, but like it would be top down, but wholesome. So that was my kind of

like, it would be like teaching, because teaching was all I knew, it would be like teaching, but we

won't be doing like the boring stuff, it would be den building, a fire lighting, and cool things,

and because it's cool things in all the air quotes in the world, you just imagine the group going

with you, you know, you imagine like, I'll lead them over here, we'll do some dens, and you,

if you, yeah, and I think there's, because there's two types of flexibility that are demanded of you,

almost as soon as you get in, which is one is the flexibility of the whole group says,

we don't want to do dens, we want to play King in the castle, or you know, we want to play

attack the treehouse, and the need is so strong, and the expectations of the pedagogy are like

go with it. So you have to be that kind of flexible way, you're like, I've gone without this,

and then there's the other type of flexibility, which is the like, like shotgun effect,

which is where two people do want to make dens, but three people want to go and make swords,

and one of them wants to go and climb a tree, and that level of flexibility to go all in terms

of community, I am also having to be way more flexible than I might have expected in going

yes four times, you know, and being comfortable and working at how do you hold that, as opposed to

like someone who might be like, I'm very flexible, I, if the group wants to change, we all have a

vote, and then we decide if the, on the vote, if that's where we're all going to go, do we all

want to go to the river, not enough of you voted to go to the river, so we didn't go to the river,

that's a different type of flexibility to oh god, that's how they're going to describe the shotgun.

Yes, and it's very taxing, I like, I don't want to be negative, but I want to be honest about

like my own experience right now, and we talked about how this is the podcast often have commented

to us, oh my god, we should have the partnership that you guys have, like I just wish that I could

be working with another person, and now we're not working as a partnership in the woods anymore,

and how we can reflect on that, and for me that kind of saying yes four times, holding in your head

what everybody is doing, and how you are going to monitor, facilitate, encourage all of those

things all at once, and where are your resources that you need, and the tools and the thing, and that

executive function was for me the most difficult thing about trying to come back to the woods after

having been ill and been away for a year, like four or nine months, my level of executive function

was not up to par, I just couldn't do it, even to the point where you know the sixth person comes

up to you and says can I have some scissors or paper up the cabin, whatever, and you're like

I'm now broken, because I had a different question, a different question, a different

I've just talked to somebody about like the sex life of bees, and then

about this, and then mitten, and then someone's asked me if they can do something really dangerous,

and then somebody comes up and says they need some scissors, and I'm like I now need to sleep,

because that is too many thoughts on my brain, in different compartments and categories,

just can't do it, just can't do it, and that is flipping exhausting, it's that, it's not just the

like physicality of being outside, it is the flip flopping in your head between the different

brain spaces and different brain roles and different roles that you have, like that's a lot of like

code switching, isn't it? It's a lot of like yeah, that's I think the term, that's not the exact term

because that's to do with different things, but code switching is a is a close enough term,

because sometimes it is code switching when you're like, and the 11-year-old is asking me about

like how does carbon stick to trees? What does that process? And a five-year-old comes up and asks

like which is your favorite teddy in the box, and the code switching in terms of your like

role to be like, okay, why I think like it's almost impossible to have, I think I remember

thinking that like when I was teaching, I'd almost crafted, because I was you know teaching a specific,

well I was basically a mid-year group, but let's say they're like between seven and nine,

and between seven and nine I could slowly craft this teacher mask that fits seven to nine-year-olds,

and so it could be quite different from me because I could put it on properly, the mask can be like,

and this is the best one for the jokes are aimed at seven to nine-year-olds, the tone is

appropriate for seven to nine-year-olds, the you know they're all this stuff, whereas when you're

if you try to do that in a mixed-age group and but you know some people will be running forest school

stuff with just seven-year-olds right, and they can have just a seven-year-old forest school leader

persona, or just an early years forest school persona, maybe that's one of it.

Yeah, do you think it's also about, it's about not, it's aged for sure, or stage you might say,

it's about an actual stage, but there's also something about like the variety and the breadth of

human experience that is possible in the woods, and you are in, you're the responsible adult

for all of those experiences, so somebody's having a spiritual experience with some nature on the

one hand, and then someone's shouting themselves, like, hey that could also be a spiritual experience.

With all the teaching about carbon seeking to trees in the middle, you know, so it's like, yeah.

I think it forces, I think it forces you into a place of having to be way more authentic.

That's an expectation that I would not have been able to articulate before like even like

going through the training and people being, especially just doing this as this is my job,

right, this is my full-time job, I don't have another place, I don't like teach and then I do

for a school on a Thursday afternoon, like this is who I am, and so there is nowhere to,

almost like not nowhere to hide, but it would be so unbelievably taxing to go in with 19 different

masks for the different, like you're having a Dragonfly funeral, and you want to like paint

like your face purple, and you want to like sing ring around the roses, and you just at a certain

point, you just leave the bag of masks at home and go, this is what you're going to have to get a

very authentic version, which I think is more, I couldn't again, I couldn't have articulated this

beforehand, but I think it is even more valuable than providing people with a mask because they

see all the times that I am not perfect in a situation, that I am making jokes that don't land,

or that I am a little bit flustered when it comes to like, hey we've started cooking and actually

that person's just jumped off something higher than they should have, so I need to go and

place bin over there and they're seeing a very authentic person, but yeah, and you're

encouraged to articulate. That's very difficult thing to articulate. It is, and that happens because

you are encouraging that in the participants as well, that they are hopefully masking a bit less

than they might in a classroom setting or somewhere else, so that if they are not interested or has,

yeah, have a thought, they may be. Yeah, like going back to what you said about

the, about what you told us training and weather and stuff, I think another of my expectations

was that just outdoors is always good, just outdoors is great, like everything can happen,

just outdoors, which just makes it betterer, and so it will all be great, and then you get there

and you're like, okay, outdoors is good, and we need to create several different spaces to meet

the needs of several different humans, and oh hang on a minute, this thing that I thought was going

to be great won't work because outdoors, and we need to change.

Well, this is another bit, isn't it? It's like, and it's adjacent, I think, or maybe parallel to

the, anyone can do this job, you don't need any qualifications, it's like a similar level of kind

bypassing, you know, it's not spiritual bypassing, but maybe it's like nature bypassing at this point

where it's like, everyone feels better outside, everybody's mental health is better outside,

and what that kind of puts across is maybe that like as a teacher, as a leader, you'll have an easier

time outside because everyone will be more relaxed, and every study that's like, well, just by being

in nature, people's cortisol goes down, you're like, yeah, because that study was done in a

forest in Japan that was entirely still, come out to my northwest facing hill in Devon, and let's

see where people's cortisol are, you know, in January, with your one year old, it's actually happened

to own like Scandinavian level of thermals and waterproofness because we don't in Britain have

those things just on hand, and yeah, unless you've been to a Scandinavian show and bought some

very expensive things. And even then the cultural stuff, you know, all the cultural attitudes that

don't, this was another thing that I thought I, this is highlighted, I hadn't thought about this,

actually, but the level that I thought it was going to be picking up a Scandinavian model of

community or education or approaches to everything, and I was going to be doing that in the UK,

and actually the boots on the ground thing being like, no, because the people that come aren't

Scandinavian, and the land is not Scandinavian, and the stuff is not Scandinavian, and so what you,

you know, I think that's one of the things that depending on how much your training focuses on

that historical element, and as time goes on, I would hope that there is more and more evidence and more

stuff to resources to draw on of like UK forest school, and that's not necessarily leaning on like,

it's this beautiful, perfect Danish Swedish thing that we are trying to bring over, and more of

our like, yeah, we've developed a practice in this country, and if you go and talk to people

that do forest school in Singapore, they will have Singaporean forest school practices, and if

you go and talk to people who are doing it in Italy, they will have Italian forest school practices,

and that kind of like really beautiful amorphous shape that forest school is, is again something that

you can't articulate, I think, going in, until unless you have so much experience, because for me,

it has been every single person that I've met from a different space doing forest school has chipped

away at whatever shape I thought forest school was. Oh, you do it with exclusively autistic kids.

Right, okay, there's a bit of the shape kind of changed. Oh, okay, you do it with like a completely

free model out in the Italian mountains, and it's all like a home-ed cooperative that, right,

that's the shape of forest school completely changed, and you couldn't put all this in at the start,

do you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. I think one of the things that is

I think it's tricky because I think this is over and underrepresented in people's expectations,

and in my expectations, is the business side of running things, and what I mean by over and

underrepresented is I think that I'm treading very carefully here. I think that things like

booking systems and invoicing, and those kind of things are slightly overrepresented in online

groups, because they are things that you can get systems for, or they are things that you can get

software for, so they're very easy to ask for support on, and also once you have a system in place,

those things falling, you know, you've never invoiced a school before, someone goes, how do I

invoice a school? You learn how to invoice a school. You now know how to invoice, right? You can

invoice any other school. The bit of the business running that I think is underrepresented,

and it's underrepresented because there is no easy solution, is the relationship

navigating with customers and families, because that is the business side of things that is not

the case of like, oh, you know, had to navigate this kind of thing with a family five years ago,

and I've got all the emails, so I just send exactly the same email responses to this family

who have similar things this time, you know. And you see that on forums with people talking

about such worldly different practice, in terms of let's take an example of like somebody, a family

coming for a long time, but not paying for their sessions. So that's an example that you see on

forums quite often, and some people will be like, do you know what, I don't even mention it.

If they're not paying, I just take it that they can't afford it, and I don't even go there,

and I just let them come, and I don't, you know, I don't even ask. Another people going absolutely

not like payment upfront, if they haven't paid, they're not going through the gate, you know,

and all of these different kind of approaches, which is down to yes, you know, you as the business owner,

and you as the person, and as you say, your relationships with those people, and what kind of

atmosphere you want to create, but also the reality of what you need to do, because there are definitely

lots of people, and because you can see this on forums, kind of running businesses where they are

literally losing money, like they are just so keen to do a certain thing, and to provide certain

resources, and create such an atmosphere that actually they are not making profit, and that isn't

good, because people deserve to make a profit, and also in terms of it being sustainable, like

you've gone out to try and create a relationship with people and place, and if you can't then keep

it going, because you've bankrupted yourself, then that is all over for everybody. Similarly to that,

I wrote down that I thought beforehand that business wise and running things, like a bit of

insurance, bit of first aid, and some just like really robust plans, that's fine, that's all you

need to do, and reality of it. Hang on, I need seven more minutes.

Okay, just have some really good plans, and I'll be fine. That's the, you know, there's no trauma here.

No, basically, all of the like professional stuff, like the off-stead, like the local count,

like relationships with the local council, and obviously depending on what type of

authority you offer, but there's always going to be a big dollar per that, which again, it can

be in your training in terms of this is a legal requirement, or this is recommended, but depending

on where you are and what setting you are, things are going to come out of the woodwork, because you

never expected someone's going to go, oh, are you registered with the food safety blah, blah, blah at

the council, because you know how you're like providing meals now on that like after school club,

and you're like, what, sorry, what, what even is that? Like, I don't, you know, so, and so,

I definitely, and I've written down like, take the skills required, are to take it seriously,

but wear it lightly, and I found that, so flip in hard, right, because I can do one or the other,

I can take it seriously, and then I'll find like it'll affect my practice, because I'll just be like,

we can't do that thing, because whatever I've still come at this exact moment, or I've just done

my first day training, and therefore, council, all that type of play, because it is just true

to address, or whatever, I like, that is what you did, I know, every time, every time, or I can wear

it lightly, and just forget that I have to do any of that stuff, and just choose to like,

conveniently forget it, which obviously not possible, so that ability to kind of like,

you've got that solid professionalism, and legal stuff, and insurance stuff, all in place,

but you're still able to be really silly, and far around in the woods, is like a huge challenge,

and I guess that's still the same thing as kind of switching, isn't it, that, spinning plates,

and switching between personas, yeah, it's worth it, I agree with it. It's a different type of

code switching, which is like switching from like business owner to play worker, essentially,

and being able to, you know, move those two things over, and I think you're right in that,

it would be impossible to give someone all of those bits of information right at the start,

but like, here's everything you could possibly ever need to be registered with, ever,

but also I think that that is something that's quite nice that you get to learn it slowly,

because it is quite often, I like, oh, you've started doing this, how about you register for

childcare vouchers, oh, you've started doing this, how about you make sure you're on this kind of list,

and like, for a lot of them, the penalties for not being on them are quite minor, because more

often than not, it might get flagged, and you go, do you know you're not registered with these guys,

and go, oh, yeah, okay, great, I'll get registered with them. And then once you are, the benefits of

each of those things, they kind of stack on top of each other, because they're quite easy to maintain,

they're just a case of like, slowly learning, and then you sound like the most professional person

in the world when you're like, well, we're registered with this, and of course, we would go through,

you know, Lado, things here, and our local off-state appointment is here, and I go through this

stuff, and like, those kind of things, I think, are very, yeah, I think I, one of the expectations that I

had that I think, and this ties into my feelings about the training,

adverts and stuff, is I think it was definitely maybe sold as the is too extreme of a word,

because maybe this came from me, but I definitely had the expectation that after doing my level three,

I was done, and like, yeah, maybe there'd be some like spoon carving workshops I wanted to do,

or there'd be some kind of like, I could go to the local meetups and learn to do a bit of weaving,

but that I would be broadly like a competent, a feel competent, feel like a new what was going on,

could deliver this stuff, and then maybe this is just a like, you know, because of who I am,

because of who, you know, you and I ended up working together, and our brains both work in this kind

of way where we, it's not, I don't think it's the either of us, I wouldn't say we constantly feel

incompetent, but when we find out about new things or new ways to do things, we're both very like,

oh, God, we've got to learn about that pretty fast. Oh, okay, what there's a thing called PDA is

there, right, get on it, right, we need to learn all about this, hang on, what does, what does a

declarative language mean? Shit, okay, right, we've got to learn, you know, which I think is one

of the joys of the job, the fact that you're in control of that, like, that you can just go in any

direction and like, whether that's prompted by people that you're working with or your own

special interests or the place that you're working in, you can just carry on learning and learning

and learning in so many different directions, and that is lush, bloody love it. It is lush, I think I,

I've spoken to a few different people about this, the people that are listening to this that know

that I've had this conversation is that like, this may be the bit where I'm the grumpy old teacher

in the corner of the staff room, right? But there is a point as well at which if you stay in for long

enough, you know, we've been doing, I've been doing this for over 10 years now. So bored of what's

the best fire pit, I'm so bored of like, what game do you start your session with? Because, because

it's been, it's been non-stop growth for the industry, in the 10 years that I've been doing it,

and like, that's a great thing. That's an amazing thing for any industry to be constantly training

new people and having all this growth. And I think one of the things that pushes me into those,

like, well, what do we read a weird book about moss and slime is because of a frustration around,

like, even I've done those questions. I maintain that a lot of people who are better at social media than

me are better at social media than me because they say one thing over and over again. So they'll be

like, children need mud. And they're like, we're the mud, we're the mud explorers, children need mud.

And then they're like, they do another post afterwards. They're like, here's five great reasons

where mud, you know, should be in your kids' play. And they'll be like, here's the best things to

put in your mud kitchen. And then again, another one that'll be slightly rehashed of like, here's

six reasons why mud is great for your mental health. And like, to me, I'm like, hey, mud's real good.

Done. Move on. Duck and weave. Do you know what I mean? Which is, which is why we, you know,

why we do the podcast, why I'm churning out videos because I'm just like, interesting things,

new things. I cannot do this. And sometimes, and this is the thing that I think is an interesting

expectation reality kind of thing is, I know that some people's training have this more or less,

but that the expectation that there would be kind of maybe 20 core activities,

den building, fire lighting, you know, whittling, those are your core things. And you're going

to do those all the time. That's what forest school is. You are going to love those things. And

there'll be new shapes of den, but it'll all be, you know, a bit more like scouting, you know,

like you revisit den's every term and all this stuff. I very, very frequently, if somebody's

been new in the group and I go, well, can you just stick the fire on? And I'll realize that there's

maybe a been a kid that's been coming to home edge for, I don't know, it could be like four or five

months. And I go, if you never let a fire, I think a no, no, no, fire has always kind of been on

or somebody else doesn't like it. Oh, oh, you should do some fire lighting. Oh, God,

what do you mean we don't build it? Oh, dense, because I've gone off pieced in terms of like,

listen, we're going to do burn spoons that we've made from like harvested ivy stems and

to it. And that's a bad idea. I was a really shit example of just a bad project.

Listen, we're going to see if we can light our farts with a ferro rod. So we're going to see

which of the mushrooms in the forest is edible by tasting. It's a roulette game. It's a roulette

game. So everybody take one. Oh, yeah. But imagine I said better examples. Imagine I was like,

you know, we're going to take some, so we're like, I don't know, holly bubble blowers, but we made

the bubble mix from conquer soap. And like, that's the thing we did a little while ago. And I was just

like, yeah, of course, because that is interesting to me. My own like dopamine seekingness was like,

yes, yes, got to do that. And then sometimes the kids are like, can we build a swing?

Yes, suppose we can. Yeah, all right.

It's a bit basic. I'm a bit rude one, isn't it?

Oh, God.

Can I do my last one that I wrote down? Yeah, I thought for a school is for children.

That's what it is. Oh, yes. And it's me doing for a school with a children. And what the

reality is is that even if you are running, of course, loads of people around sessions that are

there's not even a child left. And that's, but even the sessions where you're like, hey,

everyone come to this forest school session for children, bring your children to the thing and

the children will do these activities and stuff. Actually, those adults are there and they are

people. And it took me blooming ages to actually work out what to do about that. I think both of us

may be. We're like, okay, well, in terms of not just what one needs to do to prepare for that,

but also what you might need to do to respond to that. So I wrote down that

relationship was made in the woods are like really meaningful for some adults.

And really not meaningful for other adults. And you have to be prepared for both those things.

So some adults might end up really forming strong attachments either to the forest school leaders

or to other adults that are there in the setting and make really lasting and deep and

very interesting relationships that I think maybe don't happen so much in other places and might

find a kind of groove with other adults that are like, oh my god, this is the place where I get to

like be a bit unmasked, be a bit real, talk about some topics that maybe are a bit like out there

or I get to feel like I really belong here and it's really meaningful. Whilst at the very same

session, you will have other adults who are like, literally don't give a shit, I come here because

my kid likes it and I don't really have any deep investment in this. I might come next week,

might not. That's all good. It's just like another drop in kiddie music session. And that is

that is also fine. And having to navigate both of those kind of extremes and be the forest school

leader that those adults might benefit from, I found it was like so in terms of yeah and like

needing to be ready to kind of support adults who might be going through a tough time to

sign post adults to other support that's available if you can't offer that support like that was

a lovely and unexpected side to forest school that I wasn't aware of before we started and

actually that is about the fact that it's not about activities for children in the woods is about

community. And so if you build a community then stuff that happens in community is going to happen

and you have to be not ready because there's stuff that you don't you can't prepare for but just

to be aware that that might happen was yeah something that I definitely didn't foresee.

Yes it's that thing isn't it like yeah the holding space for community then puts you in a

position where you need to hold it outside of the den building that's the that's the one of the

the biggest things as well I think is that you know maybe this expectation that when everybody

goes home it stops that that's either when the thinking stops or that that's when the kind of

community holding stops and actually the community holding is 24-7 every every email it's every

message in a group chat it's every kind of like inference that maybe pick up or drop off or you know

it's all of those things are a big responsibility and this is where I get back into

and maybe to bring this slightly you know full circle is this is where I'm in that thing of like

would do you need specific qualifications to hold community for people no there is no kind of like

I've done an NVQ3 in community space holding but is that the same saying anyone can do this

or anyone would want to do this that's the bit that maybe is different is is is

it is such a vocational thing it is such a thing that you have to really believe and see the value in

and to know and also knowing that like there are a million ways to do it because you want to hold

community space in one way and another you know like you were saying about the refunds and stuff

like you might want to hold community space that does you know basically stop you know you're very

caring in the sessions and then it kind of stops and you're not that thing or you might want to

but people are always going to ask if you maybe not outwardly ask but they are if you hold

community for people they're always going to ask if you will hold a little bit more you know

and whether that's like a direct hey any chance I could come pick them up at four instead of

half three today because you need to get the little one to the doctors or whatever or if that's

like you know stuff in the middle of the night where somebody goes listen this has happened in our

home situation and you're the person that the kids know best any chance we can do xyz you know

that stuff is as much above community holding as the den building as the you know doing whatever

else I think one thing I am pleased about though over the time that I they didn't have an

expected I didn't have any expectation of is how much what I know I know this is a privilege

position to be in but how much been able to make our site feel like and to me at least like an

outdoor home that it is comfy that there are nice places to sit that there are you know various

ways to cook and that there are transient you know frontier stoves and chimneys in places to keep

shelters warm and that I think maybe the expectation that I had was like a very

the more like people that are on rented sites you know full leave no trace

yeah minimalist bushcraft minimalist I actually really love this the homeliness of the outdoor space

that's one of my yeah yeah totally yeah so to kind of we talked about maybe

to finishing to finish off like imagining a imagining a world where all of this can happen and

those job adverts would not be lying and it would be like you can do all this and more

and earn a living wage and it won't be so stressful that you burn out it'll be great because it

is great you know it's you know so what would let's just say in the UK like what would

what would the economy look like what would the social systems look like that were enabled

back to happen like I was just thinking as you said about being a community holder and all of

these things that we've just described and I've certainly brought up a lot of challenges about

like having to be this person but also this person and also this person like in my idealist

imagined world where this could happen and you could survive and pay them in wage you don't have

to be all those people you are able to have a community building team not just two people even

like you have a person who just loving loves doing all of their like registrations for things

and then training the rest of the team about the registrations for things but those don't worry

guys I'm going to be the person who does all the documentation and I'm going to remember to

renew all the memberships and subscriptions and I love that it's great and you know and it being

more like a school in that way that you've got like the admin person and you've got the first

data person and you've got you know and they all work as a family network instead of it being like

one person has to hold all of these skills and practices and ethos things within their ones

getting like that's what I would that's what one thing I would do what would you do what would it

look like um I think I think I would like so I've been very honest with people over over the years

I've been doing this and that one of the things that I do like about the Ferris forest school

pedagogy industry whatever else it is um is that because you bring so much of yourself to the work

like we say about that like being authenticate you know thing that um there the the levels of

competitive that you can be business to business are actually a little bit tricky because

because you can just be like oh do you know what we're not maybe the right space for you but

somebody I know is 10 15 miles away runs a space that is going to weigh more suit to do

or need or somebody you know there are people that join our waiting list who are like we're currently

going here but they've told us that this is a different place that might better suit our families

kind of situation you know um I think their dream world would be that it is

community funded and I don't know whether especially that is

part of or not part of government local council whatever that is but in some way that was kind

of like a flat kind of like you're going to get this to hold space that's that's what you're

going to get and then to increase the number but possibly decrease the physical side of a lot

of forest school spaces so to have maybe even the same community delivering in a few different

spaces but being like there's a pocket here there's more in the in the same density as maybe like

you know when they build like 2030 new houses and they go and we have to have a play park

in that there are these just little hubs that are spots and go yeah and we all share this one's

mostly run by me but that one's mostly run by Wemps so when I'm over in Wemps one I'm a playworker

when I'm over in this one I handle all of this kind of stuff and um but that kind of like

could sort of imagine a model there like just as you were saying that I've sort of imagined

it being run by the council and you being you know the team of forest school leaders that the

council um employ and like like park rangers almost in that kind of model of like you have a salary

and it's from the council and these are the places you might work and these are the kind of things

you might do but yeah I think that's why I was like you work really well that's why I said

community funded in some way because I think once it was linked to the council it would be linked

with schools and it might be linked with outcomes and actually like that's something that I

would really want to safeguard against is any kind of like ah they voted in this local council

type thing and so even though the community really loves this thing and would still privately want to

old contribute um you know the new councilor has decided that it's going to yeah well really

in a showmer let's say they want more flags on lampposts right let's say that and then all of

this shit goes you know you'd have to be unionized in that way wouldn't you if you're going to come

under the third is it the third sector well that's charities second sector I know maybe I know

the thing you mean though it's not probably at the moment is yeah yeah but in that I think there

would be there would be scope for the diff because I you know been talking to a lot of people

reasoning there needs to be some spaces that run on one to one adult to child ratios and there

needs to be some spaces that run on one to fifteen and there needs to be not one to fifteen that's

not good you know one to eight and there needs to be some that run on like one to three and like

those places if they were flattened access wise would then be I think really beneficial

to be able to kind of signpost people to like hey this is the best fit for you and rather than

there is sometimes a slightly uncomfortable thing where forest school leaders are

making a size nine shoe go on a size ten foot because they're going well actually combination of

like there's nowhere else within driving distance for this family and also we don't have the funds

to quite meet their needs and so get the shoe on and also like a you know we're in a capitalist

system whether we like it or not and a feeling of like I can't necessarily say no to this so I've

got to get this shoe on the foot you know bits like that I think I would love to see those flattened

out um you know those kind of things yeah but that said that said all of this said right one of

the things that I love the most about the forest school communities and one of the things that I

think again these kind of training things and depending on the type of consultancy I think these

also touch a button is that for me the one of the things about having to wear all these hats

is that it's fucking punk it's punk as shit to be like I am crying here's a fucking invoice and

it's on a pitter paper but it's legally fine and here's like the fucking shed and I've nailed the

shelves in and they kind of all janky in there holding here's you know yeah I'm on the food hygiene

thing and look at this this is how I do the food hygiene thing and like meeting all of those

expectations yeah in a very DIY punk kind of way and that's something that again I would really

want a safeguard against any kind of like because you could go what about an invoicing system that

just meets every forest school leaders needs ever and they all go into this big pool and then we

all do it like because there's some kind of punky you know counter culture thing yes there is

you would lose if you suddenly had and also here's another thing here's another thing and I saw

a description the other day if somebody was talking about middle managers and they said that the

purpose of there's a layer of management and their entire purpose is to keep the people who make

decisions away from the people that have to enact those decisions and saying that the middle manager

is the person in the middle of the goes CEO has said we all need to focus on this and I'll eat that

and then I'll also eat the stuff coming up from people who go we have to focus on what we have to

foot whereas because forest school is punk and flattened and like you are the person that does all

the things you can be super agile there is no kind of like oh top down this kind of makes me want

to do I yeah yeah yeah for waiting for permission from someone to do a thing or yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

do I wait till I do I eat yeah I like your your beaker of Robina you've got there's like a

tupperware it's not even a cup it's like it's a deli cup it's a liter deli cup like the rim is

that not really like unpleasant nearly said a really rude thing known because you put all of the

you put all of the components of a joke in front of me and when the rim is the rim not really

unpleasant and then listen I haven't said this and I haven't done anything with that I'm

I'm going to go and eat some toast now slunch time all exciting I've been out this morning

moving gravel so I'm doing admin work this afternoon yeah gravel for the pond gravel for

bum shuffle river oh my god I know people are going to be like what the hell is bum shuffle river

you'll never know you'll never know update next time please we'll do all right mate okay bye