Teacher, Outdoor Learning – East Lothian Council Outdoor Learning Service
Location: Musselburgh, East Lothian, Scotland
Salary: £27,498.00 – £41,412.00 per year – plus additional allowances
Closing Date: 15th August 2021

East Lothian Council is seeking an enthusiastic and highly motivated teacher on a permanent, full time or part time/ job share basis, to use the outdoor environment and adventurous activities as an approach, to deliver the Curriculum for Excellence.

The teacher will be responsible for assisting with the successful delivery of the Outdoor Learning service vision:

• To enable every East Lothian Council school to deliver the Curriculum for Excellence using the outdoor environment.
• To assist schools in delivering regular and frequent outdoor learning which is sustainable, high quality, progressive and linked directly to the relevant experiences and outcomes in the Curriculum for Excellence.
• To be regarded nationally as high quality educators of Outdoor Learning providing valued input to national organisations and best practice initiatives.

The vision can be achieved by working directly with members of school staff and designing individual, tailor made teaching programmes and resources for the curriculum and relevant key ‘Experiences and Outcomes’.  Delivery of the programmes (dependent on qualifications) is either carried out by the member of school staff, the Outdoor Learning teacher or Outdoor Learning associate/ freelance staff.

The Outdoor Learning Service provides support, advice throughout council services and delivers wide range of Outdoor Learning Staff Development (CLPL) courses.

The Service is made up of a Principal Teacher Outdoor Learning, two Outdoor Learning Teachers and an Outdoor Learning Technician, plus Associate/ Freelance Instructors who work on a casual basis.  The staff have a broad range of outdoor national governing body qualifications.

The Service is responsible for maintaining East Lothian Council’s Adventure Activities Licence. 

East Lothian offers a rich variety of landscapes for land and watersports activities.  With the Lammermuir Hills to the south, a coastline of broad sandy beaches and rugged cliffs to the north and east, and an expanse of arable farmland, woods and rivers between.  The local environment offers not only a significant potential for adventurous activities it is also an ideal setting for more traditional curricular study i.e. Geography, Biology, History etc.  We are not constrained to East Lothian and have the ability to offer courses further afield.

Outdoor Learning Teachers will have responsibility to develop and manage their own programmes.

To find out more including how to apply please visit:https://www.myjobscotland.gov.uk/councils/east-lothian-council/jobs/teacher-outdoor-learning-226836

Further information about the service can be found here:

Web – www.eastlothian.gov.uk/outdoorlearning

Twitter – @eloutdoored

Facebook – @elcoutdoorlearning

Instagram – @eloutdoored

We are pleased to announce a heap of new courses and regulated qualifications for January onwards. These include:

Regulated First Aid

SQA accredited with a mix of distanced learning online via Google and face to face practical sessions in a ‘covid-secure’ environment.

• Emergency First Aid at Work – basic first aid for life-threatening emergencies
• First Aid at Work – for higher risk environments including secondary schools
• Paediatric First Aid – recommended for anyone working in Early Years and would replace any current FAW qualification

Outdoor First Aid

ELC accredited 2 day course – fully outdoors.

SQA Accredited First Aid for Mental Health

1 day and 2 day distanced learning courses available (SCQF Level 5 and 6). You can jump in at any level without the need for prior learning or experience.

Walking

Lowland Leader Award qualifications, accredited by Mountain Training. Full course outdoors.

Our courses are also available to non ELC staff. Joining instructions for each course clearly set out the pre-requisites and any regulatory/assessment requirements for the qualification.

All training hours contribute to any required CPD/CLPL hours. Waiting lists are available for MiDAS and Cycling training.

Get ahead of the game and view our full Course Calendar here.

In these new challenging COVID times the Outdoor Learning Service teachers have changed the way we work and we now spend most of our time teaching curriculum topics outdoors in school grounds.  We’ve been promoting this as our Outdoor Teacher in Residence Programme.

This way of working allows us to teach pupils in a COVID ‘safer’  teaching space, and helps class teachers see that learning outdoors does not need to be as hard,  scary or unpleasant as they may think!

At the end of each teaching block we get the class teachers we’ve worked with for their feedback,  including; what’s worked well, what types of pupils have benefitted the most and whether the experience has encouraged them to get out more with their class.

The following response from a teacher in one of my recent schools I think says a lot …

Absolutely brilliant, and just what we are hoping this different way of working would achieve.  As outdoor educators I think we too often miss stressing the obvious because we’re so close to it.

Our next ‘Covid Update for First Aiders’ Webinar will be on 28th October, 4.00-5.00pm. The event is free and will be hosted on Google. A link to the event will be sent by email on the day of the course.

Please not this is NOT a replacement for a first course but will give you essential information on how to reduce covid transmission whilst administering first aid treatment.

Get your ticket now using this Eventbrite link:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/webinar-update-for-first-aiders-during-covid-tickets-126719061123