Longridge Towers School to put outdoor learning and sustainability in the spotlight

Across the UK, the figure of children playing outside their homes is now around 27% and when compared to grandparents, 80% of adults aged only 55 and 64 played outside regularly – it is stark.

And yet, the UK Children’s People and Nature Survey of 2024 found that 91% of children and young people agreed with the statement ‘being in nature makes me very happy’.

The Schools (Residential Outdoor Education) (Scotland) Bill, now heading for Royal Assent after securing support from Scottish MSPs, will enable children in Scottish state schools to experience at least five days of residential outdoor education in their 11-13 years of school.

It is a step forward, but it does highlight a gulf between state and independent education in the 21st Century.

One of the best examples of this may be Longridge Towers School, which nestles in close to 100 acres of scenic countryside next to the River Tweed and just over the border with England near Berwick.

Such is the area’s scenic beauty and reliance on agriculture, it is probably no surprise that the environment plays a central role in that school’s curriculum.

‘Forest School’ and ‘Beach School’ are not one-off days every blue moon, but part of weekly learning and a core outdoor education ethos that includes residential trips every year.

Its most recent for senior pupils was to Borneo and next year they head to Botswana, with Scotland’s Western Isles and Finland on the map for younger ages this and next year.

The school is holding a ‘Sustainability Week’ next month (February 2-7), open to all members of the public, to widen awareness of its approach to helping children to understand and protect the planet.

Headmaster Jonathan Lee said: “With all the challenges we have in the world and in our surrounding countryside, for our young people to have the confidence to make the right decisions for our future we need them to be knowledgeable – and to be knowledgeable we need to educate our children in what is around them, and help them spend time in their natural environment to get a feel for it.”

Outdoor learning lead at Longridge is Morag Smith, a teacher with a rich and varied background. She studied botany at Durham University alongside David Bellamy, who would go on to become Britain’s foremost TV botanist, before she went on to gain a physical education degree.

She did not move immediately into teaching, preferring a life on the ocean waves working on charter yachts – a ‘Below Deck’ with sails is under-selling it.

She would often cross the Atlantic or be found delivering yachts from Finland to the Mediterranean, and even once cooked for the Prime Minister of Malaysia.

“So, you can see where I get my passion for the outdoors from,” she said.

“What we try to do at Longridge is educate children in a way that they grow accustomed to the outdoors.

“As we go up through the years we further and fine-tune survival skills, with foraging and cooking over the fire, navigation in nature and useful preparation for the Duke of Edinburgh Award.”

There is a passion right across the Longridge staff for integrating outdoor learning into mainstream subjects. Co-head of the Junior School Sarah Murray has been another key, passionate figure in developing Forest School from Early Years and now welcomes visitors from schools across the country to see it close up.

That ensures outdoor education is embedded across the school and supports Morag’s passion and experiences, and understanding of the abilities of children when pushed beyond their usual boundaries.

She explained: “Residential trips are crucial to a young person’s confidence, independence and resilience, and their understanding of the world.

“We take a group to the Inner Hebrides, for example, where we go out on a research vessel that has been used on the BBC’s Blue Planet, the Silurian, and we monitor whales and dolphins and the damage being done to the oceans by humans.

“The Sixth Form expedition to Borneo last year was wonderful and the children and their families still talk about it. We climbed Mount Kinabalu, at 4,000 metres the highest mountain in Malaysia, but we also worked in a local village building hen houses, repairing storm damage and beach cleaning.

“In our final week, the students had the opportunity to gain their open water PADI certificate, diving in the crystal clear waters of Kota Kinabulu.

“It’s very important to us that all children can go on these trips, so we work very hard to make that possible as a team by making the trips affordable through fundraising, but that makes the whole process extremely rewarding.

“You see the children growing over the three weeks you’re away and they come back more confident, knowledgeable people with valuable life skills.”

Longridge Towers School’s Sustainability Week will include daily events showcasing a wide range of work being carried out at the school led by staff, external partners, parents and grandparents.

For more information about the school, Sustainability Week, or to arrange a visit, go to https://lts.org.uk or email Registrar Michele Burns – [email protected]