Meet Ross Torode
I’m Ross Torode. I run Nature Connection on Roots Field, a stretch of clifftop above Guernsey’s south coast that has been in my family for a long time, and that I’ve spent years slowly bringing back to life.
- Role
- Nature educator
- Groups
- Ages 5–11, Saturdays
- First aid
- Outdoor First Aid
Why we use the same field every week
Most outdoor activities for children are one-offs. There’s a place for those, but something different happens when a small group returns to the same land again and again: the children stop being visitors.
They learn where the fire circle is without being told. They remember which den fell down over winter. They notice the gorse coming into flower because they saw it bare. That’s the whole approach: small groups, the same place, term after term.
Genuinely child-led
I don’t arrive with a lesson plan. I arrive with a sense of what the group has been drawn to lately and let the session grow from there. If a child spends the whole morning on one den, or one beetle, that isn’t a session going off track. That is the session.
What I do bring is safety, structure where it’s needed, and the skills to help when a child wants to take something further: fire, tools, wood, tracking, shelter.
Please feel free to bring along any discoveries or stories in nature from you and your children, any crafts they’ve been working on, or ideas they’d like to try on the land. It’s all welcome.
Beyond the Saturday groups
The Wilderness Guardians are run jointly with Tara de Jersey of WildGuernsey, whose knowledge adds real depth for the older children.
At the end of each full term the land opens up for a family session, and each autumn there’s a free Children’s Forest Community Day: craft, food and tree planting, open to anyone. I also help run children’s activities at island events like the Rocquaine Regatta.
Practical things
- I hold a current Outdoor First Aid qualification.
- Every child is covered by a general consent form, completed once a year.
- Updates on weather, kit and changes go out through a deliberately quiet WhatsApp group, or by email if you’d rather.
Come and see the land first
You’re welcome to visit before you book. Drop me a message and we’ll find a time, or come along to an open family session at the end of term.