The indoor Orienteering game
To prepare the boys in advance for orienteering, you should teach
them some basics of map reading. Orienteering depends heavily
on the competitor being able to read an orienteering map quickly
and accurately.
One exercise that is useful can be done indoors at a meeting
before the event. You need to start with with a rough drawing
of the meeting room. Add details like furniture, windows, doors
etc.
It is very effective to draw it on a page of a flip chart as
you explain it to the scouts. Prior to the meeting you should
have drawn the floor plan carefully on another page of the chart
and draw circles around specific locations on the floor plan (map).
Before the scouts are in the room hide small prizes, or certificates
for prizes at each of the circled locations. As you produce a
second version, let the scouts decide what important features
should be on the map.
You may have to guide them into using features that you have
already selected on your first map. After discussing how the map
should be drawn, you flip the chart to your more carefully drawn
copy with the control locations, and explain the rules.
The scouts should read the map to find the prizes. You may want
to lay your map on the floor to let them orient it to the real
world (the room). Show them that they can do this by using the
features on the map and thus do not need a compass to
orient a map.
For the next meeting, expand your map to include the grounds
near the building then perhaps the whole neighborhood. Soon they
will outgrow this map and be ready for some real orienteering.
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