Tide's out, school's in: the many benefits of beach teaching

Following forest school, latest trend in getting children to learn outdoors is beach school

On Bovisand beach near Plymouth, the school day begins with morning assembly and a briefing about sea safety. The timetable will vary, but there will probably be a session on marine pollution and what you can and cannot put down your toilet, followed by shelter building, sand art, and lunch (in your shelter), then rock pools, a beach clean, and finally stories and roasted marshmallows around a seaside camp fire.

Welcome to beach school. After the success of the forest school movement, which has encouraged teachers to take tens of thousands of school children out of the confines of the classroom to learn outdoors in a natural environment, there is a new push to teach on the beach.