Activities
Navigation Games is full of fun and educational activities for all ages and ability ranges. Each of these activities are designed to practice specific skills, and present different kinds of challenges for participants to consider. And, of course, they are all tons of fun as well!
Animal-O is one of our most popular activities for children up to about 10 years old. This activity is more heavily focused on having fun than learning any concrete navigational skills, but it does begin to develop spatial awareness, pattern identification, and physical fitness.
Controls are scattered around an area with a known boundary. Each control has a picture of an animal. Levels of the game:
Touch as many cones as you can find. How many were there?
Each cone has an animal on it. Look at each animal and see if you can remember all 10 when you get back.
Use this punch card to check in at each control, to prove you were there. Did you get them all? How long did it take you?
Do it again, and beat your time.
Visit these 5 animals in this order (card they carry with them).
Do it again, and beat your time.
Do it again, without the card. Did you beat your best time again?
Repeat 5-8 but with a different set of 5 animals.
Repeat 5-8 but with a series of 10 animals.
Draw or look at a map of the checkpoints. If I point to one, can you run and touch it?
At home base, see if the team can remember which control had which animal, and write it on the map.
Go out in the field as a group and check that the map is correct.
Courses on the map that has the animals shown on it
Courses on the map but with no animals on it (but the numbers are given in a clue sheet).
Courses on the map with no animals and no clue sheet.
Teachers can make this easy on themselves by allowing any child the power to certify completion of a level that they themselves have already completed. They can help teach too.
Vampire-O is a festive orienteering event that works best with large groups of people. Vampire-O is based on a variation of orienteering called Score-O (where participants may visit checkpoints in any order they wish), but with an added tag component.
Vampire-O is a festive twist on Score-Orienteering (Score-O). Similar to a classic Score-O, participants may find checkpoints in any order, and may visit as many or as few checkpoints as they wish within the time limit. The "winner" is the person who finds the most checkpoints in the least amount of time.
Unlike classic Score-O, this event includes vampires! Lucky for us, Cambridge vampires are fairly tame, and are not after your blood. They're after your punchcard instead. If someone (let's call them Person A) is caught by a vampire (Person B), they will swap their punchard (containing all the checkpoints they've visited) with the vampire's. Now Person A is a vampire, and Person B is a normal participant trying to collect checkpoints. There are no tag-backs, so the new vampire must go elsewhere to find other prey. Not all vampires are bad, though. There may be one or two friendly vampires roaming around with buckets of candy, so look closely if you think a vampire is approaching.
Fortunately, there are several objects that help protect you from the vampires. These objects are hidden at various checkpoints around the course, but no one knows ahead of time which immunity items are where. It's first-come, first-serve. The immunity items include a garlic chain, a cross, and a gallon of holy water (yes, you have to carry this with you the entire time). If a vampire tries to vamp you, but you or your team possess one of these immunities, then you are safe from the vampire and may proceed to collect as many checkpoints as you wish without fear!
Prizes are given out according to no particular system. Someone may receive a prize for returning first with the fewest checkpoints, while someone else may receive one for having the dirtiest punch card.
Please be sure to bring your own flahslight, and dress according to the weather.
Detailed Breakdown of the Rules:
This event is score-O style; participants are trying to collect as many checkpoints as possible within the time limit.
Returning to the finish after the time limit has expired will result in a loss of 1-point per minute late, starting from the beginning of each minute. Returning 20 seconds late will result in a loss of 1-point. Returning 4:56 late will result in a loss of 5 points.
Before the start, each team will receive a map and a punch card (they will not look at these until the start time). When the race starts, participants will reveal their punch cards. If the card is marked with a red "V", it means that person or team is a vampire. Teams without any special markings on their card may immediately proceed to finding checkpoints. Vampires will give other participants a brief head-start, and will receive a red glowstick. All teams (vampires or not), must stay together for the entire race. No splitting up is allowed as this can result in confusion if part of a team is caught by a vampire.
In order for someone to be "vamped" (caught by a vampire), the vampire(s) must tag one member of the target team. At this point, the vampire(s) and the other participant(s) will trade punch cards and the red glowstick. The previous vampire now has a normal punchcard (including all of the punches collected by that team), and the participant now has a punchcard marked with a red "V" along with the red glowstick.
PLEASE NOTE: We're all here to have FUN! If a vampire gets close and vamps you or your team, please honor the game and trade cards with the vampire. Do not just run off. Not only does this ruin the game for others, but it is also cheating. Teams identified and reported for such behavior will be deducted points, or—in extreme circumstances—may be disqualified. There are also no tag-backs, and no puppy-guarding. Vampires must stay at least ~50 feet away from checkpoints including the finish.
Immunity items protect entire teams from vampires, even if just one individual is carrying the item. Again, teams must stay together to prevent confusion. Immunity items are only effective as long as a team possesses them. If a team finds the holy water, they must carry it with them throughout the course in order to be protected by the vampire. Same goes for the cross and the garlic chain. If a vampire attempts to vamp a team with an immunity, the team needs only to present the immunity item to the vampire, and then proceed with their race.
Counterfeit immunity items are not allowed, and attempting to use one may result in the offending team's disqualification.
REMINDER: This event is intended to be FUN! We encourage competition and strategy, but would like to emphasize that good sportsmanship and positive attitudes are what make the event enjoyable for everybody involved. As long as everyone has a good time, we're all winners!
Poison Score-O was developed as a way to encourage precise map-reading. In this format, participants must visit locations marked on the map, while avoiding checkpoints not displayed on the map.
Maze-O functions a lot like it sounds. It's orienteering, but in a maze! This can be anything from a chalk maze on the ground, to an elaborate corn maze. This activity emphasizes map orientation, and planning ahead.
Maze-O is an excellent little training exercise that is suitable for all ages and experience levels, from the newest beginners to national champions. What makes Maze-O such an effective activity is the simplicity of having to read a map, plan a route, and execute that plan on a basic level. As participants become more advanced they will be able to navigate the maze more quickly and accurately. This is turn will encourage them to read the map and make decisions more quickly, as decision-points and turns come up more quickly when their speed increases.
The maze Navigation Games typically uses is contructed from a 7x7 grid. This can be made with either stakes and string placed in the ground, or drawn with chalk on a basketball or tennis court. Checkpoints are placed throughout the maze, and participants are provided with a basic point-to-point course that guides them from one checkpoint to the next. The maps we use are also cut out in a circle. We do this to encourage participants to rotate the map in their hands as they navigate the maze in order to keep everything matched up properly. Trying to find checkpoints in a maze becomes a very difficult challenge if the map you're using isn't properly aligned with the walls of the maze, so this becomes a good opportuity to highlight the importance of map-orientation as well.
Grid-O is used as an introductory activity before introducing a full-blown map. By using a grid of cones (or other objects), children start to develop an understanding of relative positioning and map-orientation.
Grid can be done in a variety of ways depending on the skill level of those participating. Like many other activities, Grid-O can be used effectively for anyone from beginners through elite orienteers depending on how it's implemented. The primary skill developed using Grid-O is map orientation—a fundamental skill necessary to master before leanring more advanced skills—although other skills suck as route-choice and spatial poisitoning are developed as well. During Grid-O exercises, there should be emphasis on always keeping the map oriented in the same direction, regardless of which direction the participant's body is facing.
At Navigation Games, most of our grid exercises use a 3x3 grid. One of our most basic progressions begins by numbering the cones so that the top row are all #1s, the second row are #2s, and the third row are #3s. Students receive a sheet with a series of arrows, and all they must do is walk in the direction that each arrow indicates, adding up the numbers as they go. In order for this to work, it is very important that the students know to hold their sheet of arrows facing the same direction the entire time. Otherwise, the arrows will turn as they do! When they get to the bottom of the list of arrows, they say their total number from adding up the numbered cones, and the instructor checks to see if their total matches the answer key.
The next stage is done in almost entirely the same manner, but the map the students receive shows the 3x3 grid itself, as well as lines connecting the cones they must visit. They go to the cones indicated by the map, adding up their totals, and report back at the end to see if their total matches. Once again, it is important for them to keep their map held facing the same direction the entire time. Otherwise they might not know which cone to go to next.
The final stage uses a much more complicated map, but functions in much the same way as the previous two activities. For this, the map resebmles a point-to-point course, where every control is straight, sideways, or diagonal from their starting point. The distances between checkpoints on the map should vary greatly as well, but checkpoints are always just one cone apart (for example, #5 and 6 on the map might be twice as far apart as #10 and 11, but in both cases the student is still moving just one cone in the indicated direction). Again, it is very important for students to keep their map oriented in the correct direction! If participants are proficient at this level, they should try to do it moving at a faster pace to see if they can plan ahead as they move.