Mini Nature Trails
Activities | Trees | Observation Walks | Scavenger Hunts | Nature Bingo | Birds | Deadfall

Plan on dividing your group into teams of four. Prepare a set of 10 coloured sticks for each team, using a different colour for each set of sticks. A simple way to do this is to colour popsicle sticks with felt markers or crayons. Select a theme for the nature trails that complements other activities you have planned for your park visit. Possibilities include: animal signs, sensory experiences, plants, litter or a letter of the alphabet.

When you are ready to do the activity, divide your group into teams and give each team their set of coloured sticks and tell them the theme. Explain that each team will put one stick into the ground to be the start of their nature trail. They then look for something that relates to the trail theme and mark that second stop with another stick. Each team continues finding interesting things and marking the location until the sticks have all been used. Each stop should be no more than ten “giant steps” from the previous stop and each stick should lean in the direction of the next one. Point out the boundaries and then ask the teams to go make their nature trails and return to their start stick when finished.

Have neighbouring teams trade and try to follow each others’ trails. One person from the team that set the trail should stay to help, if necessary, the new team find the sticks and to collect each stick when it is located. The team following the trail could record the “exhibit” found at each stick.

When everyone is finished, gather the teams together and discuss the “exhibits” on each trail.