Celebrating 10 years of Forest School
DSP is celebrating ten years of providing Forest School sessions to all children. As part of this celebration, the Scaip Project was formed to inspire and support more Nature Based Learning happening in schools across Ireland.
The goal of the project is for all children in Ireland to have the opportunity to lead their play and learning in nature as an integral part of their education and healthy development by providing resources and examples and training in this. Have a look at www.naturebasedlearning.ie
DSP Forest School sessions
Our sessions bring the children and the curriculum to the forest on Killiney Hill weekly for a block of time. The structure of each session allows the children to build connection: to themselves through sit spots, creative opportunities and reflection; to each other through games and teamwork; and to the world we live in through experiencing it with all their senses.
The aim is to foster resilient, independent, confident and creative learners using a flexible approach and natural resources.
The learning flows out of the sessions in so many ways. English, Geography, Science, Maths, SPHE, Music, Art, PE, Ethical Education and drama are all covered in the sessions and then the richness of the experience continues the engagement and motivation in the classroom and at home.
Have a look at the wonderful blog posts below and those by Liz McMahon with whom we collaborate to run these sessions. https://dlrcreativityintheclassroom.wordpress.com/
Forest School
Forest School Updates
6th class – Bee-ing natural and grateful
This week was the last week before the 6th class students become assistants for the younger children. They have demonstrated leadership skills in the last few weeks, learning games to teach the younger children, noticing things in nature to show them, figuring out how to …
4th class – Session 6 – Busy Bees
We can forget or just not realise how important outdoor play is in childhood (and beyond). This page from the Forest Fridays book is here to remind us. The full book is available on https://www.dspns.ie/scaip/. This week, as always, the children had lots of ideas …
6th class – Session 3 – swings, knife work, cooking and visitors
March 14th 2025 We continued with playing games that we can teach the younger children. Today it was bat and moth. We noticed that some children prefer to be the bat with a blindfold and trying to catch the moth with ‘echolocation’ and others prefer …
6th class – Session 2 – hammocks, tarps and games
Hammocks Today we were learning how to put up hammocks with tree straps and carabiners. This will be really helpful when they are assistants for the 1st class and Junior Infants. There’s lots of problem solving and awareness building in this activity. They needed to: …
6th class learning to be assistant leaders
The sun was shining its welcome to 6th class as they started their final DSP Forest School sessions. There was a real gladness and gratitude for being back in the forest with their friends. We started by playing a few games. As they are beginning …