The Courage to Say Yes: Benefit-Risk Assessment and Dynamic Risk in Schools

In many education settings, adult fear, over-compliance, and misunderstanding about duty of care can lead to unnecessary restriction of children’s play, challenge and agency. Yet children need opportunities to encounter uncertainty, test limits, assess danger, and develop confidence, resilience and sound judgement.

This workshop explores how elements like Benefit-Risk Assessment and Dynamic Risk Assessment can support educators to move beyond risk aversion and towards thoughtful, defensible, child-centred practice.

Designed for educators, teachers, education assistants and school leaders, this practical workshop unpacks the research, philosophy and legal context behind risk in schools. Participants will explore the difference between hazards and risks, examine why over-intervention can undermine children’s development, and learn how to use dynamic, in-the-moment professional judgement in playgrounds, outdoor learning contexts and everyday school life. The session will also address common educator fears, including litigation, responsibility, and the tension between policy, instinct and professional trust.

Grounded in contemporary research and informed by Educated by Nature’s Risk Management Framework, this workshop invites schools to reframe risk not as something to eliminate, but as something to understand, assess and work with. Participants will leave with practical tools, shared language, and greater confidence to reduce red tape, ease fear, and enable more play, challenge and growth within authentic education contexts.

The workshop emphasises practical implementation within real school contexts and supports educators to make balanced, professionally defensible decisions that align with contemporary understandings of child development, wellbeing and duty of care. The session supports schools and Early Learning Centres to build a shared language and consistent approach to risk, helping leadership teams, teachers and education assistants work more confidently and collaboratively together.

Key workshop outcomes

By the end of the workshop, participants will:

• understand the difference between risk, hazard, challenge and danger

• understand the rationale and research behind benefit-risk thinking

• feel more confident using dynamic risk assessment in real time

• recognise how over-intervention can reduce children’s agency, resilience and judgement

• better understand where responsibility sits in school contexts

• be able to begin unpacking policy and practice through a benefit-risk lens

• leave with practical language and tools to enable more play and supported risk-taking