Welton Free Rangers Forest School has recently welcomed two miniature horses, Raven and Poppi-Red, in the hope of offering Equine Therapy to children with more challenging needs.

The Forest School, which will celebrate their tenth anniversary in August, offer one hundred and five spaces to children from birth to five years old.

Their aim is to be a respite for children and parents with additional needs, focusing on emotional and social development by encouraging the children to engage in the outdoors, embrace risk and learn how to manage it.

It has been proven that spending time with animals can boost a child’s self-esteem and confidence, so by investing in the two small breed horses, the nursery believes that they will very quickly become extremely important factors in shaping the early years children’s lives.

Charlotte Lucas, Co-founder and Owner of Free Rangers told The Journal: “We passionately believe that having animals allows the children to develop their emotional, social and communicative skills.

“The fact that the horses cannot talk means that the children have to learn their behaviour and therefore have to learn how to control and deregulate their own emotions around the animals.

“We brought Raven and Poppi into the team as we believe that they will help us to bring to life our vision of an Equine Therapy Centre to enable the children to learn how to be close to animals and care for them.”

The school believes that Raven and Poppi acting as therapeutic horses will add a much-needed early intervention to support their vulnerable children who have experienced traumatic circumstances in early life. The children will learn how to feed, groom and muck out the animals in the aim to provide individuals with the opportunity to ‘establish behavioural boundaries’.

Courtney Sperring, Childcare Assistant and Project Co-ordinator for the new Equine Therapy Centre is passionate about using the small breed horses to not only teach all of the children how to care for another life, but also give the twenty children, who require their own special educational needs, the chance to build on their own confidence and skills they would otherwise not have the opportunity to in another environment.

The nursery are opening up the Therapy Centre to special needs schools in B&NES, as well as families within the community, to offer them the opportunities to benefit from the various skills needed to care for the small breed horses.

Visiting the site shines light on the hard work that goes into creating such a welcoming environment for all of the children attending the Forest School.

An appeal is being launched to help the nursery keep up with the funding costs of the Equine Therapy Centre and continue to provide a safe place to encourage the growth and development of the current and future children.

For more information on Welton Free Rangers Forest School, visit: http://www.freerangers.org.uk/