I despair when I hear stories about teachers wearing goggles to put up a poster with Blu-Tack or when people say that it is “illegal” for a school nurse to apply sun cream to pupils.

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) assures us that such obsessive health and safety-first behaviour is unnecessary and not backed by regulations.

I feel sorry for children growing up in this cotton-wool culture. And I feel sorry for teachers. I believe teachers know instinctively that children need to experience a sense of adventure through their learning. Instead, too many children are growing up scared — they know how to pass a test, but to succeed in life they need also to learn about life experiences, including taking risks and sometimes failing.

We need to give teachers back their licence to thrill our youngsters. Everyone, from government ministers to business leaders, HSE and teachers, seems to want to push back on risk aversion but it’s hard to understand what is stopping us from doing so.

Barriers may include fear of litigation or prosecution; the need to cover our backs; angry parents; confusion about what the law requires; time pressures; or fear of media coverage.

Teachers need to be clear about these barriers and be given confidence to overcome them. Key to this is learning the principles of good risk management. The risk should be thoroughly assessed and appropriate measures put in place. We all want our kids to be safe, but we also want the risks they experience to be managed proportionately, appropriately and with common sense. It is a question of balance.

Teachers and others would be amazed what local education authorities will allow if you work with them to manage the risk well.

This week I have seen examples where teachers have made incredibly innovative use of the curriculum to stretch their pupils. The result is more enterprising, life-savvy, confident children who have lived a little in the classroom.

Sensible risk management is only one part of the answer, the second is an acceptance that accidents happen. The compensation culture that has developed in this country, driven largely by commercial gain, is the underlying cause of the fear we now feel.

Sensible precautions should be put in place to mitigate risk but zero risk is not possible and we are experiencing the price we pay in society for pursuing it.

As an entrepreneur I know that it is vital to learn how to deal and live with risk, learn from mistakes and failure. Children who are exposed to managed risk benefit in terms of their education, their employability and as better members of society.

Risk offers danger and opportunity. It is time to stop concentrating solely on the dangers and promote the positive side of the equation, too.

• Simon Woodroffe is patron of the charity HTI’s Go4it Awards, which are presented nationally to schools that demonstrate a culture of creativity, innovation and adventure for learning with a positive attitude towards risk www.go4itschools.co.uk

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