Fire - understanding the need for safety as well as what materials are useful for making a fire.

One lesson example could focus on developing children's phonics knowledge. The children could go on a phonics scavenger hunt, looking for objects and natural materials that have different sounds in their name.

Describing the environment. Encouraging children to use their senses.

Can be linked to stories and poems about nature and the outdoors. These can be used as hooks for outdoor lessons.

Develops children's speech and language.

Children can read non-fiction books about nature and what lives in a forest school environment. e.g. insects, frogs etc.

Children can use sticks to practice handwriting and letter formation.

Children can learn a wide range of vocabulary associated with outdoor learning and forest school.

Can use sticks and other natural materials to practice number formation.

Can use natural materials to show different amounts and to demonstrate the concept of more than and less than.

Longitudinal studies e.g. observing the growth of flowers that the children have helped to plant and maintain.

Shapes - children could go on a shape hunt to look for natural materials that are different shapes. Can talk about properties and whether or not they are 2D or 3D as well as equal or not.

Ordering or grouping materials by size, amount etc. Encouraging children to reason why they have ordered or grouped them in certain ways.

Cooking on a campfire is a big part of forest school and this encourages children to use their knowledge of measure and fractions. For example, they may need half a cup of milk for hot chocolate, or 50g of hot chocolate powder. By learning about these mathematical concepts in a practical way, children are more likely to develop a secure understanding of these topics as they become more memorable.

Position and direction - children can work in partners. One person in the partner must guide the other who is blindfolded. They must use directional language such as forward, backward, left, right to complete the challenge.

Statistics - children can collect data from the outdoors and use it within their maths lessons.

Fractions - dividing food or drink up into certain amounts for the children. Encourage children to work out the amount and use mathematical language to explain their workings.

Considering the properties of different materials and their usefulness when den building or for building homes for animals.

Can measure lengths of sticks and compare them.

Developing an understanding of what different kinds of species live in their forest school environment and what they need to survive.

Explore using the sense of sight, touch and smell.