Hedge-U-cation CIC provides art, craft and land-based educational and therapeutic activities with the aim of developing resilience, encouraging independence and improving social, emotional, mental and physical well-being. We promote outdoor learning, traditional rural skills and environmental awareness.
Hedge-U-cation supports families and individuals from all kinds of backgrounds, with a diverse range of needs.
The Hedge-U-cation project
Hedge-U-cation offers workshops and activities for children, young people and adults. These include Forest School, traditional arts, crafts and rural skills, wild food foraging walks and plant identification, wild cookery and nutrition, therapeutic horticulture, mindfulness, music and performance.
Read more: Hedge-U-cation workshops and activities
The Hedge-U-cation approach
“Passion is lifted from the earth itself by the muddy hands of the young; it travels along grass-stained sleeves to the heart. If we are going to save environmentalism and the environment, we must also save an endangered indicator species: the child in nature.”
― Richard Louv, Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder
It is a well-known fact that more and more children and adults spend much of their lives indoors, using computers and mobile devices, and less time outside. We aim to provide a way for people to reconnect with nature and themselves, through outdoor activities.
Hedge-U-cation facilitates a child/person-centred environment. We are family-focused, believing that by engaging in activities together, and sharing skills through play, exploration and a certain amount of risk-taking, we can encourage confidence, self-awareness and resilience.
“It is argued that taking risks can have positive implications in terms of children’s developmental, social and emotional needs, as well as their overall health. By providing the opportunities for children to manage their own risks in a controlled environment, they will learn vital life skills needed for adulthood, and gain the experience needed to face the unpredictable nature of the world.” – Tim Gill, founding patron of the Forest School Association, 2007
Hedge-U-cation for all
We feel that the Hedge-U-cation approach can be beneficial for everybody. For this reason, we aim to make our workshops, activities and events as inclusive and accessible as possible. We offer provision for children exhibiting challenging behaviour, young people with Special Educational Needs (SEN) and those who are at risk, have been excluded from school or who struggle in social situations. We support people living with Autism Spectrum Conditions (ASC) and/or sensory processing sensitivities and those affected by anxiety, depression, bereavement or post-traumatic stress. We welcome participants from hard-to-reach communities and have a bursary system to help fund places for families and individuals on low incomes.
Our ethos
We believe that learning new skills together in the outdoor environment promotes resilience, helps to improve social, emotional, mental and physical well-being and strengthens community cohesion.
Our mission
To foster a person and family-centred, holistic approach to working with people.
To ensure that all work with children is child-led and centred around play as a therapeutic learning experience.
To provide a non-judgemental, experiential and positive learning environment that enables people to:
- Explore and learn more about themselves through engaging in activities
- Nurture an interest in the natural environment
- Learn and improve upon traditional skills and crafts
- Engage with exercise outdoors
- Develop and sustain positive relationships
- Experience mental and physical health benefits
- Take risks in a controlled environment
- Have fun!
Our aims
To set up a therapeutic and educational centre for crafts workshops, arts, and events including: forest school, workshops, therapeutic horticulture, wild food foraging, wild cooking and nutrition, music and performance.
To run affordable courses, workshops, forest school sessions and events, promoting traditional skills and crafts
To be inclusive to all, and have a bursary/sliding scale system for fees
To promote outdoor learning and sustainable organic food growth through our forest school
To create and maintain therapeutic gardens
To offer volunteering opportunities, including supported volunteering for those that need it.
To provide mentoring programs for young people
To have access to woodland for coppicing, forest schools, foraging, primitive living and survival skills, and environmental awareness education..
To create employment for local crafts people, land workers and communities.
To create a hub – a place to learn new skills, share ideas, meet new people and feel part of something exciting.
Meet the team
Hedge-U-cation is run by a small team of directors, project managers, area co-ordinators, workshop facilitators and a growing number of volunteers. Meet the Hedge-U-cation team