The first four scavenger hunts of the 365 day nature play challenge. 1. collecting little things; 2. finding big ones; 3. a little one spotting the early signs of spring and 4. for a group of 7-10 year olds.
352 – the First Scavenger Hunt: Collecting things…
Tuesday 14 January. Light drizzle. 8°C
Time for a scavenger hunt. We do a lot of treasure hunts but a scavenger hunt is something we are less used to. Like with the 355 – Gathering ingredients for potions challenge, I’m aware there are less options in winter. Very few bugs about and very few plants (particularly in our garden which suffers from too many rabbits). I decide to head out behind the house where there’s a bramble patch and a small bit of green public land. There’s an industrial building as well with a fair bit of weeds and things under foot to find. Sticking to what we found last time I write out a list of 12 things she has to find as follows:
– an old brown leaf with holes in it
– a round green leaf
– a bit of holly
– the spiky brown case of a conker
– some moss
– a dried out blackberry
– a stick
– a strawberry leaf (we have some in a tub in the garden)
– a green leaf as long as a pen (there’s some dandelion-ish leaves by the back gate)
– rabbit fur (our pet ones are shedding)
– a spider web
– some hay
I give B 15 minutes to find them all and then make a ‘352’ picture for the blog. I suspect this is too long and am right but it takes her longer than I expect. Mainly making the 352 and working out which plant I mean is as long as a pen (she’s critical of my judgement). If she hadn’t found them all three days ago it would have taken her a lot longer but I reckoned she’d also have found it too hard. As it was, it was probably a bit too easy. Perfect for a child a few years younger maybe. B isn’t sure about it. She didn’t think it was as good as a treasure hunt. She likes working out clues and she didn’t like making the numbers (she’d not generally very crafty). Being timed is fine.
I start pondering if I can do a treasure hunt which is more interactive with the natural world. We did a lot in lockdown but she got so quick at them I gave up in the end. I’m wondering if there’s a way to get this to work better and am getting the inklings of a plan for the weekend (see challenge 348 – Treasure Hunt).
We’ll definitely try scavenger hunts again though. The spiders web worked really well as it was easy to find but a bit of a challenge to collect. I think the key is going to be to find more things like this.
Having fun in the fog (350 & 351) >
< Attempting to watch the Wolf Moon rise (353)
319 – A more active sort of scavenger hunt
Sunday 16 February. Cold and windy. 5°C
After the issues of yesterday (challenge 320 – making an animal feeder) I’m determined to get a good challenge today. It feels like we’ve been stuck and rummaging around for ideas for the last week, pulling things out of mid-air and the cold generally bringing us down. I head back to the ones B has enjoyed most and decide it’s time for another Scavenger Hunt.
Last time (see challenge 352 below), we went back to somewhere we’d been a few days earlier, which we’d already firmly scouted, and I did a list of things to collect. I’m going to try a different method today. We’re staying at my mum’s flat and there’s a big communal garden we can explore. I go out the night before and look for things B has to find or do that she’s going to be able to recognise. Then I draw them onto bits of cardboard, fold them up and put them in a bag for her to pick.
B is really excited by this idea and practically runs out the door. However, we’re hit as soon as we go outside by the reality of the current February weather. While not technically freezing there’s a bitter Easterly wind and within 5 minutes all our bounce has gone. We are very ready for Spring now!
I realise that the wind is blowing particularly round one side of the gardens so head us in a more sheltered direction. The rules I’ve set are that B can pull up to 3 items out at anyone time and she has to either touch them or get physically close to them if touching not an option. I’m hoping to get her running back and forth and hunting things down.
She gets in the swing of it quite quickly despite the cold. She gets a few quickly and perks up. I give her some hints to some of them. I realise there’s a real danger if she gets a difficult card she’s going to get too cold and then lose momentum. I keep the pace up and, as we get into the really sheltered bits of the garden, she’s definitely enjoying it.
I’ve only put one task in there which is a ‘do’ rather than a ‘find’. There’s a number of different paths and it challenges her to walk every bit of each one in five minutes. I time her on my phone. She heads off with a lot of enthusiasm but after three minutes I realise she’s slowed down again and is hardly moving around some of them. I think it’s the cold again but it turns out to be her shoes, which I forgot to check! She fails to do it in the 5 minutes and then loses all momentum completely. We stagger to the end of the challenge and B makes the 319 from the clues, having to hide behind a bench because of the still bitter easterly wind.
So conclusions… the main one is that THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN SO GOOD IF IT HAD BEEN WARMER!!! Heigh ho. It’s not a surprise that cold, windy weather is a challenge. I think I probably need to be a bit more pro active in acknowledging it though. Otherwise B was ready to enjoy this one. I clearly need to do a bit more checking of what we’re wearing out too. Looking forward to trying something like it again when it’s a bit warmer.
318/317 – Wayfinding for kids >
< 320 – Making an animal feeder
294 – Signs of Spring Scavenger Hunt
Thursday 13 March. Sunny. 9°C
It’s finally showing signs of spring and we need an activity for our evening dog walk. We’ve been collecting things, but I feel like we need a change so try a little scavenger hunt challenge. B’s not going to have lots of attention so we keep it short and (I think) easy. I give her the picture above with drawings of daffodils, primroses, magnolia, blossom and crocus on it. She has to tick when she sees them.
The daffodils are ridiculously easy. I reckon an easy ‘win’ helps get her in the mood. Primroses are pretty evident everywhere too. The blossom takes a little longer but we find it in the end. The crocus and magnolia prove a harder ask. My mum’s suggested them both having seen lots in London the previous week but it’s still a bit early for them round us. Finally we find one solitary crocus and an almost out magnolia.
It’s a neat little challenge and I suspect we’ll build on it in the future. I like the picture method – it’s fun to make and B has fun criticising my drawing skills.
< 295 – Spotting frogspawn by the light of the full moon
281 – A scavenger hunt for the brownies
Wednesday 26 March. Sunny to Twilight, 11°C
Time for a scavenger hunt on a slightly different scale. I’ve signed up to take B’s brownie pack on one and am grappling with the logistics of setting one up for around 15 7-10 year olds. We’re going to the local park which has a good array of options. I go down there for a recce to check what’s findable and do a list of instructions based on that. I write them on bits of paper and fold them up and put them in a basket for them to pick, doing up to 4 of the easy simple ones and less of the more complicated or rarer things.
The full list is:
Can you find: a nut; a pretty leaf; a leaf you like; a feather; a big green leaf; a tiny new green leaf; a twig with buds on it; a nice stick; the outside of a nut; a stick that you like; something that feels bumpy; the biggest stick you can find; the smallest stick you can find; something that feels nice; something that feels smooth;
Can you: spot a bat; find where the snails are sleeping; spot a squirrel; find a tadpole; find a worm; find a hole in a tree you could hide something in; climb a tree; find a fairy garden;
We start off getting them to find a few things individually – a daisy, a bit of rubbish, etc. The conifers in the square are enjoying spring and have an array of different types of blossom and what looks like small pine cones growing on them. I challenge them to find some of those and they all get there very quickly. We clearly have some experienced nature lovers here.
We put them in groups with a responsible adult each then and set them loose on the baskets. Each brownie can take two and should get the rest of their group to help them. They’re off with abandon, varying in how much they ask for help and how much they do on their own. Collecting things is fairly straightforward and requires little assistance. They need more help with the ‘action’ ones, with some moaning at the unlikely-ness of seeing a bat (there are some there but it needs a bit more patience to stand and watch for them than is probably realistic with so much excitement) and the weirdness of hugging a tree. There’s enough room for them to opt out of the ones they don’t want to do. Finding a worm provokes ‘ews!’. Finding snails sleeping in the trunks of trees is far more appreciated.
Climbing the trees proves the most popular task. There’s some very easy trees in the park that have branches very near the ground. The girls start there and then find some which are a little harder. They’re now working properly and very effectively as a group. As the adults watch like hawks for dangers the kids work together and make suggestions which is the best way to go. They learn to check the strength of a branch before stepping on it. The ones who are more risk averse find interesting ways to move between lower branches and nice places to sit and help. Finally they all find the joys of bouncing on top of branches and swinging from them. It’s getting dark so we finish by taking all the materials gathered back to the hall and making a big 281 out of them.
< 282 – Collecting things: Catkins & 280 – Collecting things: Weird squidgy things >
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