Made for UK forest schools
Bookings and payments, registers, risk-benefit, observations and learning journeys, in one app on your phone in the woods. Write the day up as it happens, not at nine o'clock at night from a notebook that got rained on.
30 days free · no card · never per child.
Ivy's mum booked and paid online and signed the consent form.
Took the register as they arrived: seven of the eight here, two of us, so we're fine on ratio.
Six knives went out for whittling by the fire circle, and all six came back in the tin.
The stream's running high, so we went 1:1 at the crossing and kept the stream play.
Ivy led the den build today and asked for the bow saw for the first time.
Wrote a concern down on the walk back to the car. Only Kate, our DSL, can open it.
Booking apps stop at payments and registers. Nursery systems cover the indoor write-ups. Nobody covers the bit that happens under the trees: the risk-benefit call, the site check, the tools and fire, the learning in the mud. Here are three moments from a session at Hazel Hollow Wood, our demo forest school.
Everything is saved on your phone first and uploads when you're back in signal. Tools and fire are counted out and back in. A photo of a child without photo consent is never shared. Take the photo, say a sentence as a voice note, and finish the observation later when there's time. Observations land on each child's learning journey, and the whole day becomes one PDF. Parents book in with one link and the register fills itself.
Six principles are what separate forest school from a nice walk in a wood. Everything in the app hangs off one of them.
Real sessions at Nature of Learning forest school in Essex, photography used with their kind permission.
Built by a forest-school leader who got tired of paper. Comments from forest school leaders on Facebook and Trustpilot, quoted with thanks.
"This app is a game changer for Forest School leaders. To have the ability to plan, write observations, book people on, monitor progression over time and write all your incident reports in one secure space enables me and my team to have more time to deliver…"
"It's brilliant!!! 🤩"
"It's the sort of thing that can only be created by those who truly understand the reality of the day to day of a Forest School session. And the more I am using it, the more I am discovering just how much it can help me! Everything is right at my fingertips, literally!"
"Oh.my.spaghettimonster. wow. Just wow."
"I know I'm biased, I helped build it. But I built it because I needed it: I run sessions every week, in real weather, with cold hands, and this is the app I run them on. If it annoys me in the woods, Paul hears about it by tea time."
Free for practitioners
The Forest School App is free for the people doing the work. Only the forest school (whoever runs the sessions) needs a subscription, and one plan covers the whole team.
Every practitioner gets a free account to manage themselves: profile and compliance (DBS, first aid, qualifications), shared to every forest school you work for. They bring you into their sessions by adding you to the team, free for you, whichever plan they're on.
The forest school is the billing account: £8 a month if you work on your own, or £29 a month flat once you're managing a team. VAT is included either way, and so are unlimited children, sessions and woods, on both. Never priced per child.
Running your own sessions? You're a forest school in your own right, a one-person organisation, £8 a month (VAT included) after a free 30-day trial (no card). Take on staff later and you move to Team; the same login still works free at any forest school that invites you.
£8 a month on your own, or £29 for your whole team, with unlimited children, sessions and woods either way, VAT included. Start free for 30 days, no card.
Your own account, as a leader, assistant or volunteer.
Free
The forest school you work for adds you to its sessions.
A solo practitioner running your own sessions.
£8inc VAT / month
Want your team recording their own observations & photos? Upgrade to Team anytime.
Start freeA forest school where the whole team records.
£29inc VAT / month
One flat price for your whole forest school, however many of you are recording
The price on the page is the price: VAT included, nothing added at checkout. Cancel anytime, and your records stay yours. Full pricing & who pays
Sarah runs the sessions: an FSA-endorsed trainer, out in the woods every week. Paul builds the app: 25 years building software, and a forest school leader too.
More about usYes. The field app stores everything on your device and syncs when you're back in range. You can always see whether your records are saved and uploaded.
Yes. The long-term plan–observe–adapt–review cycle, supported risk through risk-benefit, holistic development tracked across confidence, creativity, resilience, independence and wellbeing, and your own qualifications and DBS kept current. Each session also becomes a PDF, ready if anyone asks to see it.
No. You get 30 days free with no card. Add one only if you decide to stay, and cancel any time before then with nothing to pay.
Yes. Volunteers are free on every plan: they go on your register, count in your ratios, and can use the app free to see their sessions and risk assessments. For your team to record what they see under their own names, you need the Team plan (£29 a month flat, VAT included). Their account is free either way, and the same login works at every forest school that adds them.
Children's data stays inside your forest school, and we never sell or mine it. Safeguarding concerns are visible only to your designated lead. We're a small British company.
Yes. Share one link and families reserve a place with just their email: no app, no account. You set the spaces and the rest go on a waiting list. Every confirmed booking goes straight onto the session register. Your terms and conditions are signed as part of booking, and every booking keeps the version the parent saw. Families sign in with a code from their email, on the website or in the app, to see the moments you've shared and keep their bookings, consents and medical details up to date, with your logo and photo at the top. Bookings and payments are included on every plan. If you take money through the app, we charge 1% (VAT included) when we collect it for you, and Stripe's card fee is separate. Free and offline payments never incur it, and your monthly price never climbs with your takings.
Your phone or tablet for the field (the app is on the App Store and Google Play) and any browser for the desk: planning, bookings, children and reports. Help lives inside the app too, next to the page it explains.
Set your forest school up in two minutes. Free for 30 days, no card needed. Not ready? Browse The Clearing for free activity ideas, no account needed.
