Our ancestors lived in forests, they had to be near certain things so they could survive. Can you think of what these things might be?
- Water
- food (nuts, berries)
- wood for the fire,
- materials like sticks
- logs to build a shelter
Human survival has always been linked to the land, understanding it and co-operating in a community with other people.
LOCATION: Woods
AGE: 6+ (more than 4 players)
DEVELOPMENT: teamwork, nature connection, distance/location/scale, plant identification
KIT: sticks (if there are none on the ground)
Set up a base camp, this will be the place that everyone comes back to during and after exploring the wider woodland.
Everyone needs to go and find a stick as long as their arm and another that is roughly half the size of their arm. Creating a wheel like the one below.
Each person stands in front of their small stick, with their back to the circle. The triangle behind them is where they will place 5 things that they discover as they are mapping the area. Each child paces 10ft and picks up something from that area, then another 10ft and picks another object, until they have all covered 50ft distance (less with younger children). When everyone has found their objects, they come back to the wheel and place the first found object closest to the centre and the last found object closest to the outside.
Gather around the map and talk about the different objects that were found, their uses and how they would have helped humans to survive in the woods.
