When you think about your own school or university experience you might have traumatic memories or absolutely amazing ones (we can debate how are brains focus on one or the other another time!), but for a moment think back about how much “nature-connection” you had. For me, growing up in the 70s, I was in London, the primary school playground was concrete, asphalt and brick, and there was a little bank of trees shielding us from the petrol station on the other side of the wall where the boys would invariably kick their footballs over to. In my secondary school there was the “teachers’ garden” where you weren’t allowed to play in unless it was a special day and you were 17 plus and in the 6th form. That exclusivity of nature from the rest of the school was a bit bizarre thinking about it. But the expectation of a paved and grey playground was the norm. I was lucky because my mother was a bit of an eco-nut and my father an outdoorsy kind of guy, so my free time outside of school was spent in the woods with th
