Shared Earth Learning reflect on a busy year at the Green Heart Space

Nestled in the valleys of Chesterblade Hills is the Green Heart Space.

It’s a quiet field, partway between Frome and Glastonbury, where the Shared Earth Learning co-op gathered (covid safely) for a day away from our usual site, to reflect on an interesting year, get to know each other better, and start making plans for next year. 

First off; thanks to Chesterblade Hills! They put a competition on social media, inviting local community groups to enter for the chance to win a day’s use of the Green Heart Space and our proposed ‘away day’ for our Forest School co-op won. (and nice one for entering us Jenny: Ed.)

The Shared Earth Learning workers co-operative includes qualified and trainee Forest School leaders, and part time volunteers with other jobs and responsibilities, so it took months to find a date that worked for us all, but finally we made it to the Green Heart Space on a sunny Saturday in October for our ‘corporate style’ forest school away day. 

The space (and weather) was ideal for an outdoor meeting; it’s where SELco loves to be and we were able to freely discuss some of the difficulties and  highlights we’ve faced this year, as well as make decisions, chat through our plans and share worries as we whittled wands, sharpened knives, played games and ate lovely food.

Our co-op has grown quite quickly over the past two years, and we are offering more hours and sessions of forest school, (soon-to-be play rangers) and outdoor wellbeing groups than ever before. Our priority is working together to help nurture a love of nature in our community. 

We’d like to thank: Children’s World charity, The Somerset Community Foundation, the Rotary Club of Frome and The Rune Tree Press for funding support this year. 

And we could not have achieved the many hours of outdoor learning and well-being sessions that Shared Earth Learning has delivered without support from Vallis Veg, Purple Elephant, Somerset Community activity and Inclusion Team, The Frome Learning Partnership and anyone who has attended any of our volunteer work days. (forgive us if we haven’t mentioned you and you’ve supported us).

And we’d like to thank Chesterblade for the free use of the Green Heart Space. We can thoroughly recommend it for when a team needs to take time out in nature, to rest and reflect. 

Find out more about Shared Earth Learning on our blog and Facebook page.