I have been volunteering at Southroyd Primary School since December 2024 and plan to finish volunteering at the end of May 2025.
My work has been around forest schooling - a fun and engaging way to learn, using natural environments like woodlands as a classroom.
My role involves supporting the forest schooling lead, for example by engaging with children during forest schooling play time, making sure they are staying on task during lessons and also teaching children activities during small group teachings.
Reasons to volunteer
I first started volunteering because I wanted to gain experience with children, as I’m aspiring to work with them in the future.
I want to become an educational psychologist, and I feel that volunteering with children in whatever capacity will help with this.
I was ecstatic when I found out that I had gotten the forest schooling role, as I had previously known about the benefits it has for children and their development and confidence. I continued to volunteer longer than originally planned because I felt like I was helping the children by being an extra person for them to engage with.
New confidence
The experience has had an amazing impact on my confidence as I have managed to thrive in an environment I have never been in before. I believe that I now have better skills in classroom management from interacting with many teachers.
Forest schooling has been a whole new experience for me. I have learnt so much about nature and how much of a positive impact this time has on children.
I have really enjoyed engaging with all of the teachers at the school who have been nothing but lovely to work with and learn from.
Connecting through uplifting experiences
Some of my favourite parts of volunteering are when I have small group sessions.
I have taught them how to weave hearts from branches, create leaf prints by hammering leaves between fabric, and my favourite one was making treats for the birds using wire, apples and raisins. It was my favourite because in one of the groups there was a child who loudly said “cowabunga” every time they managed to cut the apple themselves, and I could not stop laughing.
Another one of my favourite experiences a the lesson where we picked wild garlic and made garlic bread on the fire with it. You could just see how excited the children were to be making something from what they had picked.
Also, one day after I had spoken to Amanda about wanting to be an educational psychologist, she mentioned that I could possibly shadow the speech and language therapist that come in to help the children.
The opportunity to shadow a speech and language therapist was amazing – it allowed me to experience some other career prospects, and because of my degree, I was able to engage with her really well.
Advice for future volunteers
Volunteering is an amazing way to gain experience doing something you might like to do in the future, in order to get a feel for that field of work.
I find that volunteering allows you to ask many people about the area of work that you want to go into, giving you loads of insight about what the future may hold.
I also feel that volunteering helps you to gain confidence – specifically in my case, I found that volunteering gave me a newfound respect for what teachers do.
I was able to balance volunteering by sticking to one day a week, and because I enjoyed my volunteering so much, it felt like a nice day off from university work.
Throughout my time volunteering I have felt supported by the Students Into Schools team, specifically at the beginning when I was able to meet with them to talk through what there is that I could do when volunteering. I’m forever grateful that the team allowed me to have a place in forest schooling.
More information about volunteering
Read more student profiles about volunteering
Find out more about volunteering opportunities as a student at Leeds
If you’re a not-for-profit organisation in Leeds that would benefit from student volunteers, email the Volunteering Team at volunteer@leeds.ac.uk