I spoke with Joanne Appleby, from Oases today and then hopped in the car and went over to visit her at the E.W.E. Centre. She introduced me to her colleague, Rio and we had a long and productive chat about a joint collaboration. Whilst our backgrounds are very different, our shared values soon emerged; a belief in the benefits of play, a commitment to a natural upbringing for children, a willingness to put curriculum in to the woods rather than keeping the two things apart.
As I left, we had a brief but thought provoking conversation about the power of “God” to help children overcome modern sources of anxiety such as bullying. We discussed the idea that children can take comfort from the final judgement and their own conscious decisions to save their own souls. I must remember this when I finally get round to writing my book on the transmission of culture in schools.