Finnish pedagogy versus Forest Schools and outdoor education

Both traditions trace back to the same Nordic belief that children learn best with mud on their boots, but they apply it very differently. Forest School is usually a standalone, supplementary programme; Finnish pedagogy builds the outdoors into every ordinary school day for every K-5 child.

What the Forest School movement actually is

Forest School is a genuine and well researched pedagogy in its own right, not a fad. It began in Denmark, where outdoor preschool groups grew through the 1980s out of the broader Scandinavian culture of friluftsliv, or open air life. It reached the UK in 1993 after a group of nursery nurses from Bridgwater College visited Danish preschools and brought the idea home, and it has since grown into a structured, professionalised movement with its own qualifications.

The Forest School Association sets out six principles: sessions run regularly over an extended period rather than as one off visits, they take place in woodland or a natural space, they use learner centred, play based methods, they aim at holistic development of confidence and resilience, they offer children supported risk taking, and they are led by a qualified Forest School practitioner who holds a recognised Level 3 (or higher) certificate. In practice this usually means weekly sessions, often for a single class or group, run by a specially trained leader alongside the rest of the school timetable.

• Origin: Scandinavia (Denmark, 1950s to 1980s), popularised in the UK from 1993 onwards
• Typical format: weekly, standalone sessions over a term or more, in a dedicated woodland setting
• Led by: a separately qualified Forest School Leader, often not the class teacher
• Core aims: nature connection, supported risk taking, confidence and resilience through unstructured outdoor play

How Finland builds the outdoors into an ordinary school day

Finland does not treat time in nature as a bolt on programme, it treats it as a basic condition of how any lesson is taught. Finnish law and the national core curriculum require a 15 minute outdoor break after every 45 minute lesson, all year round and in all weather, for every K-5 pupil, not just for a class that has opted into a nature scheme. See recess and outdoor learning in Finnish schools for how this rhythm is structured across the day.

Nature study itself sits inside the mainstream curriculum through ympäristöoppi (environmental studies), a subject that blends biology, geography, physics, chemistry and health education for younger pupils, rather than being a separate enrichment activity. Teachers are also encouraged, through phenomenon based learning and general curriculum guidance, to take core academic subjects such as maths, language and science outdoors into forests, schoolyards, gardens and lakesides whenever it serves the lesson. Early years guidance goes further still, recommending at least two hours outdoors every day regardless of the weather.

Where the two approaches genuinely agree

It would be unfair to present these as opposites, because they share real common ground. Both trace back to the same Nordic conviction that unstructured outdoor play, supported risk taking and direct contact with nature are good for children's wellbeing, focus and social development, not indulgences to be earned after the real learning is done. Both value child led exploration over constant adult direction, and both treat weather as something to dress for rather than a reason to stay inside.

Where a school already runs Forest School sessions, the ethos, valuing risk, resilience, hands on discovery and calm outdoor time, sits comfortably alongside a Finnish curriculum framework rather than competing with it. Many schools that adopt Finnish pedagogy find that existing Forest School sessions complement rather than duplicate the outdoor recess and nature study already built into the day.

Where they genuinely differ

The most important difference is scope and universality. Forest School is typically a supplementary, often weekly, programme for a class or cohort, delivered in a dedicated setting by a specially qualified leader, and it exists alongside a separate core curriculum. Finland's approach is not a programme at all, it is a default feature of every lesson, every subject and every pupil, delivered by the ordinary class teacher as part of full academic rigour rather than as a break from it.

Teacher training reflects this difference. Forest School leadership is its own qualification, usually a Level 3 certificate, held by a specialist practitioner who may or may not be the child's regular teacher. In Finland, outdoor and nature based teaching is simply part of what every generalist class teacher learns during their five year, research based teacher training, so there is no separate credential and no separate adult, just one teacher applying one pedagogy indoors and outdoors alike.

Finally, Forest School's six principles are explicitly about a woodland or natural setting and a long term but session based cycle of planning and review. Finland's outdoor culture is woven across ordinary settings, forests, yes, but also schoolyards, parks, sports fields and city blocks, and it is bound to the same academic goals, subject content and assessment expectations as any indoor lesson, so it never functions as a separate track running beside the curriculum.

Forest School asks: how do we give children a rich, regular dose of nature alongside their schooling. Finnish pedagogy asks a different question: what would every lesson look like if we simply assumed children need movement, air and unstructured play to learn well in the first place.

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