Summer Medicine Making & Tree Tending Community day

Price Options

Adults £20, children free

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About the course

Join us for a morning of gathering and crafting medicines from the forest, hedgerows and meadows, followed by an afternoon tending the trees and ecosystems of the Children’s Forest. Adults and accompanied children are welcome.

We create a connective learning experience that will enable and inspire you to gather and share skills with your families and the children you work with. Through nature connection practices, practical knowledge and ancestral skills we explore connective ways to engage children with nature.

For most of our evolution, humans have lived in sync with nature.  Our nervous systems are hard-wired to respond to stimuli received from the natural world.  Faced with the over-stimulation of our modern world, our senses have become dulled and our sense of wellbeing affected.

This day offers the opportunity to remember your natural state of being in relationship with nature and to celebrate the gifts of summer.  We will use established nature connection practices to awaken your senses and restore wellbeing, and offer some that you can take with you to practice in your daily life.

Who is this course suitable for?

  • This workshop is for adults and will support those working with children in outdoor education such as Forest School facilitators.

The course will cover

  • Learn wild medicines to forage for food and medicine for all the family.
  • Create an opportunity to nurture a deeper connection to the natural world.
  • You will learn techniques, which will aid your well-being and provide an opportunity to explore your inner worlds.

About the tutors

Anna Richardson: Anna has been a nature mentor and trained forest school leader for over 20 years, working with children of all ages and mentoring adults in plant lore, foraging, nature connection and bushcraft. The 8 Shields deeply informs Anna’s work and approach.  She is passionate about connecting to nature through creativity and reverence for life and is also a forest school trainer through Circle of Life Rediscovery and has co-authored two books : Learning with Nature and The Children’s Forest and am the founder of the Children’s Forest.

Erica Shorter: Erica has been learning and playing in nature as a Forest School Leader and Nature Connection Mentor for over 10 years. She is happiest wandering barefoot in the forest and brings a flavour of deep nature connection into her work with children and adults. She is informed and inspired by the 8 Shields and is passionate about creating spaces for people to deeply connected with nature and their inner landscapes.

Testimonials

Upcoming courses

March 15 2025, 10-2pm

Tree Nursery Community Volunteer day

Free

Join us to tend the tree nursery and learn about growing trees. These are volunteer work days for individuals and families where we will tend the young trees growing in our tree nursery. Work includes watering, weeding, pricking out seedlings, sowing tree seeds and more depending on the time of year. You’ll learn some aspects of growing and caring for young native trees at each session.

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March 22nd 2025, 10-2pm

Gemmotherapy Tree Bud Medicine Workshop (for adults)

By donation

This workshop is an introduction to the powerful Gemmotherapy bud medicine made from this vital and potent emergence of life, as an expression of the energetic and physicality of the whole tree. Learn how to make Gemmotherapy remedy, which is essentially a form of herbal medicine made from the buds or shoots of young plants using extracts made from tree buds.

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March 23rd 2025, 10-3pm

Spring Equinox Community Celebration

By donation

We will gather together at the Spring Equinox to celebrate this time of rebirth and renewal as the land is fertile with new life. Wandering together we will learn about tree and plant lore as we harvest spring edibles, celebrating the gifts they provide through song and story. Returning to Spring Rise, we will share a foraged feast around the fire as we craft and sing.

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