Words by Smiley Team
Surrounded by South Devon’s green hills and valleys, The Husbandry School offers a therapeutic form of education that can’t often be found in conventional schools. Hoping to grant more adults and children access to their valuable learning space, the school seeks funding for additional buildings and facilities.
Through Husbandry practices and principles around agriculture and land management, the centre helps its pupils gain personal resilience, skills and knowledge through discovering a more harmonious way of being.
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“Our overarching principle is that everything in nature is connected, so we're responsible for caring for ourselves, as well as the living things around us,” explains one of their learning support assistants, Rachel Smith.
With additional financial support from an online crowdfunder, the school will build additional teaching spaces to accommodate more children, young people and adults with physical and mental health difficulties and additional learning needs.
Since its founders Carol and Jonty Williams created the school, its staff have seen important changes in their pupils; re-engaging them with learning, reducing their anxiety levels and improving their self-esteem. The teamwork with students from early years intervention through to formalised ASDAN qualifications with young people.
“We might see children arriving who at first are quite nervous, who might really struggle to be away from their parents or who might be quite withdrawn,” Rachel says.
“But after a short time, we soon see them growing in confidence, taking responsibility for their possessions, or taking themselves into the classroom when they arrive and getting their things out ready for a session.”
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The school takes a holistic approach to learning, including work to support students’ self-regulation, motor coordination and midline integration alongside a curriculum that engages with pupils via their specific interests. Staff find new ways to excite students about traditional school subjects as well as more technical skills, where positive social interactions are fostered through a mix of 1:1 support and group activities.
“For instance, this might involve learning maths skills by doing cooking activities with produce from the land - weighing, measuring and dividing recipes, or it may be practising literacy skills by supporting a child’s desire to learn a foreign language”. Horticulture sessions and helping with the livestock also provide opportunities for children to take on responsibility and build their confidence.
“In this way, we tend to bring teaching in sideways. We look at where students are showing the most interest and follow their guidance to help support them in other areas of development. So it’s really child-led, where we put core subjects into context with tangible results,” Rachel says.
For its adult visitors and volunteers, the school offers workshops and courses in a range of agricultural techniques, land management skills and traditional crafts.
To help them develop their work donate to The Husbandry School’s crowdfunder.
Find more information about the school at husbandry.co.uk.
