Nearly every topic in the National Curriculum can be linked somehow with a real life application through a farm visit. Please let us know YOUR aims for the visit, be it Primary, Middle or Secondary School.
Since we are a mixed farm, we have livestock, arable and wildlife, not to mention heritage, geology, and links with overseas sustainability…try us! We usually take groups of less than twenty children. Some schools prefer a half day visit, combining it with a trip to the Roald Dahl Museum in Great Missenden, just a mile away.
Health and Safety is important to us so we have various written Policies, not to mention rules we always run through at the start of any visit.
Our facilities:
- Purpose built and fully accessible toilet and hand washing block with Changing Places facility; portable four-hand-washing facility.
- Kitchen area.
- Areas for wet weather shelter are also in agricultural use ie. Working barns for hay/straw and livestock.
- Parking available.
- Historic, recently restored buildings around a courtyard.
- Limited supply of wellies/overalls to borrow.
- Livestock: suckler herd of cattle; sheep, chickens, turkeys, goats, donkeys, farm dogs, guinea pigs & quail.
- Small pond, easily & safely viewed.
- Arable fields, grassland and typical Chilterns geology
- Woodland, hedgerows and plentiful wildlife (in Countryside Stewardship).
- Mini- and macro-beasts a plenty!
- Resident experts in agriculture, ecology and bush-craft skills
- Archery range and Instructor with air rifle targets available
- ‘Tent in the orchard’ and well stocked orchard
Examples of topics:
Climate emergency: covering sustainability, and climate change and how farming is addressing this.
Farming Everyday: lambing, calving (only in the spring) and general running of a mixed farm.
Field to Plate: Looking at arable crops as well as livestock, where they start and where they finish.
Geology & Development: The role of Flints & water in historic settlement and importance of FIRE!
Historic Landscapes: considering succession, grassland management, hedge maintenance etc
Mini-beasts and Meadows: Grasslands and woodlands as vital habitats
Orchards: Management and maintenance, using the produce
Sustainability & Subsistence: Exploring world agriculture including keyhole gardens & donkeys.