Question about forest schools / nurseries

[Duckgoesquackquack]

I'm really keen for my DS to attend a local forest "woodland" nursery as he's a really really energetic boy and I think he'd love this way of playing and learning, and it would be good for him. He's still young but seems to be quite bright (not meant in a smug mum way) but as in his understanding of words and language etc is fairly advanced.

If you had a toddler at a forest school type nursery and then they moved to normal state primary school, how did they adapt to classroom based learning? Did it put them off "traditional" ways of learning eg sitting at a desk? Or did they adapt ok?

Just interested how it would impact on him. Thanks.

I don't know the answer to this but forest schools aren't uncommon. Many children must make the change.

reception is play based learning anyway with access to outdoor spaces. Ok, not woodland but better than Year 1 when it gets serious !

Id not hold back my child from that experience in case they find it harder to adapt to once at school. Sounds great, go for it !

Thank you! Yes hopefully someone will have experienced this transition. Just don't want to make things harder down the line, if that makes sense!

Bumping in case anyone has experience of this

No personal experience but I know a few children who do a mix so "traditional" pre school for a couple of days then a forest school for a day or two a week so maybe that could be an option?

What kinds of primary schools do you have around you as most here have forest schools and include them as part of the child’s learning.

Many of our local kids went to the forest nursery next to my home and are now at the local primary. No issues that I know of.
I don't know if this is the same but my early years were spent at Beach School in California. I literally spent two years on the beach going to nursery between ages 3 and 5. The beach was my classroom. At the age of 5, I started primary at my local school across the road and I don't think I ever thought twice about it. What I will say is that I have incredible memories of my beach school and my primary school. It's the adult part of my life that's been a hot mess.

Reception year is a transition for everyone. They do loads of free play still and exploring. It's not straight into sitting at a desk all day. Even in this first term of Year 1 that DS is in there is still more moving about and exploring play than there is later in Y1 and onwards.

I don't think coming from a forest school pre-school will really be that different an experience than for a child coming from a formal pre-school or a traditional nursery or no childcare.

Thanks everyone, really helpful x

DS didn’t attend because we’d only moved to the area, but virtually all his reception classmates had attended a forest/farm pre-school locally, and seemed to have no problems with the transition.