Nature Games - Fun activities with an environmental focus

Nature Games - Fun activities with an environmental focus for school camps.

LEARNING through games is a great way to keep students engaged, and where better to educate kids about nature and the environment than on school camps?

Outdoor camps make an ideal outdoor classroom – the unique biodiversity of the surrounding physical environment can help students learn about healthy environmental habitats, how all things are connected within an ecosystem, and the impact of human beings in maintaining a healthy environmental balance. Try these fun educational games with an environmental theme on your next school camp.

Ecosystem Chasey
This game illustrates the impact of change on the natural balance of our environment.

WHAT YOU NEED
A large space and lots of energy.

HOW IT WORKS

• Split your group into three teams: Team 1 are the Foxes, Team 2 the Rabbits and Team 3 the Grass. The foxes chase the rabbits, the rabbits chase the grass and the grass chases the foxes (when foxes die, their bodies decompose and fertilise the grass).
• The object is for players to ‘catch’ as many members of the species they are chasing. When a player is tagged, he or she joins the species that caught them.
• This is a fast and furious game, and teams will dwindle and grow in numbers before students’ eyes – demonstrating what happens in the environment when the natural balance is disrupted. Students will see that as food supplies dwindle, so too does the species that depends on it.

What’s that Smell?
A calm game, suitable for rainy days or during wind-down sessions.

WHAT YOU NEED
A piece of paper and pencil for each participant and a series of small hessian bags filled with various items from nature, and tied with string at the top. Suggestions include bags filled with eucalyptus leaves, lavender, lemon or orange peel, seaweed, fresh mint, earth, flower heads, sheep’s wool etc.

HOW IT WORKS

• Evenly place the hessian bags along the length of a table, with a number placed in front of each bag. Students file past each bag, lean down and smell the contents. However, they must not touch the bag, or pick it up!
• Students jot down the smell they have identified as they pass each bag.
• The winner is the person who can identify the most smells from nature.

Mother Nature
Mother Nature is indeed impressive…beautiful, unpredictable, cruel, ageless…this game helps students discover just how incredible nature really is.

WHAT’S REQUIRED
Just a wide, open space!

HOW IT WORKS:

• Students gather in an outdoor area that is dotted with foliage. Students are asked to stay within outlined boundaries, set by the leader.
• The teacher leader calls out a range of instructions (suggestions below) and students have exactly two minutes to fulfill the instruction.
• Once students return, everyone chats about their object, or what they found, before a new instruction is given.
• Instructions may include: Find an object that is dead (calming, funny, unattractive, soft); find and bring back a sound that makes you feel happy/sad/beautiful/touch/angry; look for an object that is geometric in shape; look for a natural object that has five parts; describe something of power; find an object that has a shiny texture; find something from nature that consists of at least three colours.

NOTE Students don’t necessarily have to bring back an object each time. In fact, in most cases they will only report on something they saw/felt/experienced. Remind students of the importance of not disturbing the natural habitat.

Nature Art
Nature Art is a fun, sensory game that encourages students to let their creativity run wild – and also to touch, feel and smell natural objects.

WHAT YOU NEED
A variety of natural supplies. Depending on your location, these may include twigs, leaves, pine cones, rocks, sand, feathers, wool etc.

HOW IT WORKS

• Divide students into small groups of 4 or 6.
• Give each group a bucket or cardboard box with an identical collection of supplies, ie. 20 rocks, 10 twigs, 5 pine cones, a small bag of wool, 30 gum leaves, 10 seashells.
• Ask groups to make ‘something’ with the contents of their bucket or box. Encourage students’ imaginations to run wild….let them know they can make animals, monsters, vehicles, sculptures…anything they like!
• Once students have finished their creations, get the whole group to walk from creation to creation, while an appointed spokesperson for each group explains their team’s art form.

NOTE Teachers may want to bring existing supplies from the classroom, or get students to help them collect natural supplies once they arrive at camp. Remember, however, not to disturb the natural environment when collecting items, and only choose items that are readily available and are not protected species.

The Hunter
If animals don’t stalk their prey properly, and are too noisy, they miss out on a feed. This game is designed to teach the value of quiet persistence!

WHAT YOU NEED
A good handful of small stones (approximately as many as the number of players involved in the game) and a blindfold for the student acting as the ‘prey’.

HOW IT WORKS

• One student is the ‘prey’ and the other students ‘the hunters’. The student acting as they ‘prey’ sits blindfolded on the ground in an open field with their legs stretched out, and the stones in between.
• One by one, as the teacher leader calls their name out, the ‘hunters’ approach the ‘prey’, being as quiet as they can. Their goal is to collect a stone without being heard.
• If the prey hears the hunter, they must point in the direction of the sound. If they are correct, and point at the hunter, the hunter must return to the group and await their next turn. The prey can also wave around their arms and hands to try to touch a hunter as they are trying to grab a stone. Again, if the hunter is caught, he or she must return to the start.
• The winner is the first hunter to successfully return to the starting point with a stone.