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(transcribed by AI so there maybe some small errors!)

Hello, and welcome to The Wild Minds Podcast for people interested in health, nature-based therapy and learning. We explore cutting edge approaches that help us improve our relationship with ourselves, others and the natural world. My name is Marina Robb, I'm an author, entrepreneur, for a school outdoor learning and nature-based trainer and consultant, and pioneer in developing green programs for the health service in the UK.  

Welcome to Episode 42 embodied practice in our special educational needs world. It's good to be back for a new season and notice autumn arriving, isn't it incredibly difficult to get away from screens and allow time for play, reflection, rest and social connection? I certainly find it hard. On a recent walk, I saw swallowed who will soon be leaving us for southern Africa, and I did some research on Atlantic mackerel, as I saw all these people fishing by the sea, turns out they're also leaving too and going north made me think that life is always on the move.

In this episode, I highlight the increase in special educational needs and disabilities in schools, as well as social, emotional, mental health challenges for young people, I continue to reflect on embodied practice. For me, this means our capacity to notice sensations and feelings in our bodies, which is not always very easy, and how this can help us to be in relationship with each other in a different, more healthy way.

I'm also exploring some of my and your blind spots so that we can begin to address privilege and power and afford others more dignity and respect. It's good to be back. And thank you so much for joining me again and being part of this journey, these thoughts, these inquiries into what it is to be human. And I always start, as you know, with some gratitude, and I want to just take a moment to be grateful for the privileges that have been afforded me and the awareness that I have that because I am white, because I have access to finances through work and other means that I have actually access to resources that others might not be and I'm really trying in these podcasts to pull on the threads, the threads of conversations that have been going on for the past year and growing my awareness of lots of issues.

So I know that I want to be part of change, system change, and to learn more how to share the power and privilege that I have. But I also know that in order to do that, I need to be balanced with resourcing myself in other ways, maybe accessing the natural world that not everybody can do, maybe giving myself time. Time is a resource, isn't it? Time is a really powerful resource, so that you can rest and you can recuperate. And I also want to kind of balance that thing about being softer on myself so that we can be harder on the system that we've been born into, and more critical of the system that we've been born into.

And this season, I'm really aware that I want to have conversations about access to nature and the right to roam, and also access to an education that really meets our needs. I've been really thinking about the special educational needs places that exist from the last interview that I did, and also just the work that I. Also doing in the woods with families that have severe learning disabilities, and just the wider context of the amount of young people in schools that have special educational needs. I'm going to talk about that as well, and a bit of the data around that.

But also, again, want to think about how power operates in our lives, and more importantly, what do we do about the blind spots that we have? You know, I've been reading and listening to people from different backgrounds and cultures and different colors, and how it is so easy for me as a white person, to be completely unaware of the privileges that are just occurring around me because of the color of my skin. You know, it could be from access to education. It could be from access to passports, for example. It can be many things. And I want this to be part of this conversation, because it makes a difference to our mental health, and if we're being judged on things that we can't change, like the color of our skin or the socio economic background that we get born into, then there's something wrong with our society, and It's not good enough.

So I want to be part of a community that is supporting change, and I hope you guys out there are going to be coming along with me and finding a way, step by step, to look at and discover our blind spots so that they're not blind spots. And you know, it's the work that we all have to do as individuals and as particularly if we're working with groups and people and we're practitioners, whether we're therapists or whether we're for school facilitators, knowing and being much more aware of our own blind spots and how that might impact inclusion and equality is really important. So I've also been thinking about the idea of safety.

Now I talk a lot in my work about creating safe spaces, and I now am adding in this awareness of what is safe space, you know, and what I might find safe is very different to what another person might find safe. So I think that's a important question. Is to consider what is safe for another person that you might be working with, the young people that you might be working with, remembering that they're probably coming from a whole set of circumstances and situations where, perhaps as a young child, they've had experiences where they absolutely do not feel safe in a particular environment. And also, let's remember that when we're working in schools, we're often working indoors. And of course, that's why I love the work outdoors, because there's a lot more space.

But indoors, they're working in a in an enclosed space, which is to some degree from the animal part that we are in a kind of cage. So there is impacts for that. And often the work that we are engaged with is how to be more regulators, regulated as adults, how our bodies are feeling, how they're responding, because if we don't feel safe, of course, we're going to have less bandwidth to express and experience our emotions before we start moving into fighting, fleeing, freezing and other expressions of what it is to be in a body that feels scared and frightened. So school and places where we are asked to deliver, you know, and to speak and to learn, deliver on certain outcomes that somebody at front of the classroom might want.

They can be difficult, really difficult for different people at different times. And I know you out there would have had that experience. And certainly nowadays we really understanding the impact of our past on our present, and the importance of staying in the present. If we can, of course, we can't if we have particular post traumatic stress, because the present is like is acting out what's happened in the past, but it feels like it's happening right now. But that whole skill set of being present in the moment so that we can be present and witness to the other so we're not trying to fix it and change it, but we're being present and witnessed, witnessing.

The others experience. And in that there is some huge repairing and soothing capacity, because our own energetic system, our own nervous system, is calmer, and so the other person can also feel calm in our presence. So there's a lot of work for us to do out there when we're in positions of authority, which we're facilitating groups and holding spaces, which is at the heart of a lot of the work that I do, and a lot of you out there do, if you're teachers or therapists, for example. So I want to pick up for a little bit, just on some of the statistics. Now, there has some data has been produced. It would think it was in June this year, and I'll send, I'll put a link in the show notes about it, that really is saying how much there is really an increase in special educational needs and disabilities, and we use the word send S, E n, d, and also a notable rise in the number of children with social, emotional and mental health problems. And that's, that's an acronym of S, E, M, H.

So you might see that if you look at this, look at the show notes, and you know, the data is also showing that whilst there is an increase for boys, there's also a much higher increase for girls who have educational health care plans. So in England, if you have a diagnosis, then you're often able to have an educational healthcare plan, which you know can give you extra support, although I know lots of parents and people out there will know that it can take years to get that and so some of the statistics I'm going to be giving you today are based on those that have had a diagnosis, so let alone all the young people out there, you know, and the people out there, and the adults out there, and I'm including myself out there that may struggle for all sorts of different reasons that aren't getting our needs met, or have different experience growing up.

And how we're working with that, you know, we're working with becoming more comfortable with the different parts of ourselves and how to meet the needs of those parts of ourselves. So some of the statistics are quite shocking, in a way, because I'm now thinking that, you know, we expect a lot of young people to be in school all the time, and I'm so grateful, as you would have heard last week if you listened to the podcast with David, just how empowering vocational and special educational needs schools can be. Could be with the right staff, with the right training and certainly what they're doing. And please go and listen to it.

You know, really does feel important, because those young people are having many opportunities to engage in vocational learning, you know, learning that is thinking potentially about careers, but more so thinking about practical, embodied experiences where they're learning, but they're also gaining those skills, and they're having those social interactions and wonderful things. And of course, as you all know, I'm an advocate for outdoor learning and actually getting children outdoors, moving their bodies because, you know, we know that they improve outcomes for children who may display challenging behavior. Remember that challenging behavior is challenging for us, and also real kind of empathy for the young people that are actually going through that experience, because it isn't easy. Is it to have a lot of stress in the body and to display that?

Because, you know, we're not getting the connection when we're doing that, and we're not choosing to do that either. This is where we talk about our window of tolerance being tiny. You know, the bandwidth of our expression at that particular point is tiny. Really. We're just absolutely into that freeze, that disassociation, that shut down or into fighting. I know some of you will know about that, and certainly you can look at other podcasts. Behavior is communication to give you some insight. But as a society, we are becoming far more aware of this research and this work into trauma, into mental health, into embodied practices and understanding how our nervous system is so important in terms of being well.

Accessing joy, having fun. And, you know, remember, we don't want always to be talking about the things that don't work. We want to talk about the things that do work. And getting out and moving our bodies and being outdoors is definitely one of those things as is. As you know, I would say nature, you know, the incredible potential of nature and natural materials to bring us into the presence, to help us to regulate, to allow our senses to be processed as we play and move. And you know, just so important for our well being and that we have to be well. Learning needs to be a space well, it needs to be joyful, and it needs to be happening in a space where we can feel safe. But as I go, what, as I repeat, sorry, what? What is safety for some of the children that we work with, so really important things for me. So some of the data, as I was saying, is that in England, and this data is up to sort of january 2024, I think it comes out every year, is that a total of 18.4% of children in England have some kind of special educational need. And this is up from what was 17.3% in last year, which is was 2023 so that's a total.

And I'm not great on numbers, but I'm reading this number of 1,673,000 173,000 children with a special educational need or disability. So that's a lot of young people. And we know that school is not a one size fits all well. It tries to be, doesn't it, but we know that we need to be meeting needs. And there does become a point where, if you're setting out a curriculum that is similar for everybody, that isn't going to work. And also, if you've been in therapy, or you've worked within a therapeutic world, you can't just operate in in believing that one way is going to support the healing of all the individuals, because we are complex.

It's been my word of the summer is complexity, and that, I think you'll hear that through the episodes that also follow. So we've got a huge rise in special educational needs, disabilities, and also a rise in social, emotional, mental health challenges for young people. So we need to have spaces that are respectfully and empathetically meeting children and young people where they are. They are our future. They are our children. And I absolutely feel that we owe it to all children, you know, of all backgrounds of color, different color to be respectful and to see people of having dignity, and to see people of as having equal value. Equal value is so important and it makes me think a lot about what we mean by equality.

You know the possibility to challenge prejudice, for example, and to look at our own prejudice, and you know what we mean by inclusion. And these are things that I need to work on or want to work on, and I'm hoping you out there also want to work on and there, thankfully are lots of people out there that are working on this. Books out there to read, conversations to be had, and other podcasts to listen to, as well around lots of these things. So what can we do about some of all these things. Well, we can become more trauma informed, and we can understand, at least in this, at this point in this podcast, the importance of regulation, and for me, how the natural world can really support that regulation. It's like having a third person in the room when you're in the outdoors.

And many of you have probably heard me say how I can often get cabin fever, and how being outdoors can really reduce cortisol levels. And also it's that other really important element of both emotional. Attachment, having that attachment to another human being, and also having a place, attachment, feeling that you belong, that you have a place in that space. And that does mean regular exposure, regular time to get outside. And of course, one of the things that then is going to come up as well, how do we access the outdoors if we're living in a city or actually who owns the land? And how can we have more spaces where people from more backgrounds and colors and young people can access the land?

And this is something that we are needing to really look at this point in time and it is happening, and I'll be speaking to that again in different moments. So I really feel that, as was really highlighted in the last podcast, that providing different experiences for young people within a school setting is really important, as well as having staff that are trained to be able to be aware of their own bright blind spots, be able to be aware of their own triggers, but also to really want to see young people, to see young people as whole, you know, having all these different aspects that need developing and need supporting and to understand that actually developing our social emotional selves is actually really important.

And you know, again, I want to remind us all here that it is about looking at ourselves, but we are part of a system that has been around for a long time. We often call it dominant culture, and sometimes it's really hard to see how that impacts us as individuals, and as I said at the beginning, the resources that it enables for particular people within the society. And next week, we're going to look at that a little bit more as well, and it's going to continue, I think, as a theme, because we can't end up as a healthy society unless we really start addressing these issues and becoming part of a community, a more healthy community together. And to do that, we need to begin to be comfortable with our own discomfort, and think about the kind of practice of being uncomfortable and staying with the trouble, as Donna Haraway also says, But staying with the discomfort, I can really feel, how it's so important To do that and how I want to kind of jump and distract myself out of that uncomfortable feeling in order to not feel the discomfort of my shame, the discomfort of my anxiety, my anger as it arises.

But I think as we stay with it in the present, then it has the possibility of changing and having support to do that, and I really welcome that. So I hope this has been useful, and I hope that we can start as a community to really value different peoples and different more than humans, ie, the natural world, maybe the trees, maybe the salmon that swim in the sea, value different life experiences and what they bring to the whole I love this idea, and I'm sorry, I don't know where I heard, this the paradigm of metabolism, so that everything is actually metabolizing together. Everything participates in that, you know, I love and believe in, this whole idea that everything is alive in its own way and communicates in its own way, and there's something so important as we've been brought into such a hierarchical culture with one way of thinking particular dominant people in our society, but really, you know, really starting to value other in different ways, and to Get on the exciting journey of that, to find out what I can learn from the other and you know, it's we talk about feeling like we need safety, which we do need safety. Our body needs to feel safe. But when we when we can feel safe, we can all.

So be more adventurous and ask more questions, which is where that risk comes in so much and I think we're kind of over protecting ourselves in different ways. And I am, you know, I've learned to overprotect my own vulnerability, my sense of needing to defend those parts of myself, and maybe like flipping it, is that actually the strength is to have much more of a relationship to that area of myself, to those many areas of myself, to those areas, those parts of me that are operating in my life, because then I can reach out, then I can make connection, if I can do that. So it's a journey, of course, it's a journey.

And I also want to really end, end this podcast by saying that so many of us now are having a screen based experience of life, you know, a screen based adulthood, a screen based childhood. And whilst that might have a place, I think if we need and want to heal ourselves to be more healthy, then we need to be creating opportunities for more play based, certainly in childhood, more play opportunities for more joy, and it's the same in Our life. So I wish you time to have more joy, even if it's more for five minutes. People that work with me in the woods, the parents that have children with disabilities and very stressful lies, very isolated lives, will speak to me of those moments of sitting with a cup of tea and having those space and that can bring joy, those little moments of joy, and those little moments of laughter. You know, what matters to us is really important. So again, I want to bring in this kind of acknowledgement that we are in a screen based culture, and how much of our time is being spent in that way, and how much of time can we start to bring in where our bodies are given the opportunity to feel, to play, to be in connection with others and just to just see what difference that makes.

So see you next week and again, thank you for staying with me and enjoy the autumn seizing the turning of the year to go a little bit more inward and enjoy the beauty of the leaves that are changing. If you get a chance to look outside your window or go on a walk. Thanks for staying connected to this podcast and joining me for these bi weekly reflections. Next week, I'll be talking to Sophie Christophy in a deeply thought provoking episode packed with ideas about patriarchy, consent based education and lessons we can learn from the natural world until next time.

Thank you for listening to this episode of The Wild Minds Podcast. If you enjoyed it and want to help support this podcast, please subscribe, share and leave a rating and review wherever you get your podcasts. Your review will help others find the show.

To stay updated with The Wild Minds Podcast and get all the behind-the-scenes content. You can visit the www.theoutdoorteacher.com or follow me on Facebook at theoutdoorteacherUK and LinkedIn, Marina Robb.
The music was written and performed by Geoff Robb. See you next week. Same time, same place.