Forest School Leader

**Forest School Lead Job description**

EducateU is an independent specialist school providing high quality education for children and young people aged 5 -16 with a wide range of complex needs. These needs include children diagnosed with ASC, ADHD or who have high anxiety and attachment and trauma barriers to learning. All our students have an EHCP. The post of Forest School Lead plays a key part in this provision through a commitment to the school’s ethos in supporting and delivering high standards of teaching and learning in an outdoor learning environment. The Forest School site is currently based near Arundel, West Sussex but the school is situated in Worthing.

**Working Hours**:
2 days a week (Monday and Wednesday) and paid access to attend relevant school INSET training days.

**Salary: £24,000 PRORATA for 0.4FTE (2 days) (£9600 across 12 calendar months)**

**Description**:
If you are a Qualified Forest School Practitioner (Level 3) with a passion for outdoors, who is familiar with both the Early Years Foundation Stage and Primary, Secondary school aged this exciting opportunity could be the role for you.

This role is 2 days per week - 08:45 - 3:45pm. Children will be onsite from 10:15 - 1:45pm The remainder of the time will be planning, preparation, risk assessment and communication back to key school staff.

We value outdoor learning and are fortunate to have an amazing woodland near Arundel which has been set up by staff and which enables us to deliver Forest School learning to our pupils.

**Main Duties & Responsibilities**:

- Plan, prepare and deliver purposeful and productive forest school activities for children.
- Be prepared to innovate and devise imaginatively varied ways of teaching the forest school experience to children.
- Select and use a range of different resources and teaching styles, appropriate to the forest school experience.
- Promote safe behaviours in the Forest School environment, establish routines and boundaries to ensure the safety and good behaviour of the children.
- Implement agreed practice with individuals and groups of children, in Forest School sessions.
- Work with the Forest School assistant and teaching assistants to manage and prepare resources.
- Engage with and support children’s learning and generally support children with set activities, independent problem solving and creative play.
- Always supervise children and young people, and this may include lunchtimes as required.
- Liaise with key staff at school
- Liaise with parents and carers as/when required

**Supervision**
- Working under direction/instruction of any senior member of staff, with direct supervision of teaching assistants who will be supporting the classes**. **There will be an accredited Forest School Assistant supporting teaching and learning.

**Creativity and Innovation**
- Working as part of a team, the post holder will have opportunities to work creatively with children and young people in a defined framework - e.g. semi-formal curriculum. All team members would be expected to contribute in this way to maintain a varied and interesting menu of activities for the children and young people, to experience and learn new skills from.

**Resources**
- The post holder takes part in organising the availability and use of general and specialist equipment and other resources, including checking to make sure they are clean, safe, and secure for children and young people.
- The post holder must uphold the school’s health and safety policies by reporting problems with resources and equipment to senior staff for further action to be taken.
- The post holder takes part in discussions about the provision of new resources.

**Physical demands**
- The role involves working directly with children and young people including bending, kneeling, and crouching for periods of time.
- It may also involve occasionally lifting or holding children and young people during planned activities (Positive handling training will be given).
- The Forest School curriculum requires that a broad range of activities, including outdoor play, should be made available for children and young people to access, so the role will involve working outdoors in the Forest School Area and other outdoor areas.
- Lifting and carrying of equipment and bending and clearing away after sessions are all a daily part of this role, sometimes assisted by the children and young people.

**Working conditions**
- Work involves working mostly outdoors, within the school environment, including leading and facilitating an outside environment.
- As with all work with children and young people, the post holder will experience periods of moderate noise.
- The post holder may also occasionally work in other environments when accompanying the children and young people on trips to places of interest, both within the local community and further afield, for example, on a visit to the beach or forests.
- In the event of weather affecting forest school fr