Author: Tim Pickering

Outdoor Learning Manager

Kayaking at Daliburgh School

Tim and Andrew headed to Daliburgh School to run some kayaking sessions. There is a loch next to the school and they are looking at how they can make the best use of it as part of their learning. To see how kayaking could be run on the Loch it was decided to run short sessions for young people across the school.

Although it wasn’t the best weather with the rain the wind stayed away and everyone had a great experience. There was then discussion how they travel forwards and make more use of the Loch.

Questions about Ticks and Lymes Disease

We are in the middle of the busy season, with the team out and about working with schools and young people in the outdoors. There are often questions about ticks and Lymes disease, we thought it would be useful to post some information about what to do if you are bitten by a tick and things you can do to prevent being bitten.

It is important ticks should not stop you going outside but to take a few sensible precautions to prevent being bitten and if you are, what to do about it.

See the source image

Lymes disease if carried by ticks which latch on and then take a blood meal. The Comhairle have produced a leaflet with information on the disease (CnES Tick leaflet). More information can be found on the Lymes Disease Action web site.

There is an excellent YouTube video produced by NHS highland on how to remove a tick with Dr James Douglas

There is also good advice from the NHS Scotland web site:

Be tick aware

Ticks in Scotland can carry the germ that causes Lyme disease

Ticks are small spider-like creatures that can be found on bushes and undergrowth in Scotland’s countryside, parks and gardens from spring through summer and well into autumn. Most ticks that bite people are unlikely to be carrying the germ that causes Lyme disease, but there’s no way of knowing at the time. So, it is best to:

  1. Try to avoid being bitten by ticks
  2. Remove any ticks that do bite as quickly as possible

How to prevent tick bites

You can reduce your chances of being bitten by ticks by:

  • covering skin which may come into contact with plants
  • wearing long trousers tucked into boots and long sleeves
  • using an insect repellent containing DEET
  • trying to stick to paths and avoid dense undergrowth
Hopefully this helps and if you have any questions contact your GP or if you need more information contact the Outdoor Team.

 

Tong School Orienteering

At this time of year with the good weather is when the outdoor team are in demand. Tim was in Tong School to do the Bronze Youth Navigator Award.

The session started with some time in classroom (it can be done outside but needs good weather otherwise the paper disintegrates) the young people created an ‘island’ on the classroom floor using a rope as the shore and then populated it with buildings and features. They then drew their own map of the island. This give the opportunity to talk about scale, how to denote features with symbols and the importance of the key.

This lead to talking about how important it is to orientate the map and touching on North, South, East and West.

The class were then given a map of the school grounds where Tim had already set out twenty orienteering clippers. With a score card, a map and a quick refresher on orientating the map outside the class set off to navigate around the course around the school.

At the end of the session there was a recap of the essential point of orientating the map and the whole class had completed their Bronze award.

The John Muir Award

In the outdoor team we are passionate about encouraging everyone to  appreciate what is around us. We believe the John Muir Award is one very effective way of becoming connected with the place we live and making the learning place based. There is not a set syllabus, it is up to you how you meet the criteria, and it is open to all (families can get involved, and individuals generally from an upper primary level). If you would like to talk about the John Muir Award and how you can take part in it or use it Contact the Team

There are four challenges at the heart of the Award:

Discover a wild place:

This can be the school grounds, an area near your school or something further afield?

Explore it:

Do things which will help you understand and become more aware of your wild place. Experience it.

Conserve it:

Do something practical and take personal responsibility for making it better

Share your Experiences:

Let others know about your wild place, what you have done and what you have learnt.

The Levels

There are three levels of award – Discovery, Explorer and Conserver. There is a time commitment to each and it should be seen as a minimum and the majority of the time should be spent outdoors. There is no upper limit but time can’t be carried forwards to the next award.

Discovery Award – 4 days (or equivalent) minimum time commitment

Explorer Award – 8 days (or equivalent) minimum time commitment

Conserver Award – 20 days (or equivalent) time commitment, over at least 6 months

The Thinking

The Award uses the Head-Heart-Hand Model from Patrick Geddes:

 

There is a downloadable John Muir Award Information Handbook

 

National Navigation Awards Scheme – On Going Staff Training

Just before Christmas we were lucky to have a member of the National Navigation Awards team come to Harris to deliver a train the trainer course for us, Dorothy Breckenridge from C-n-Do Scotland was visiting Harris and offered to provide the course.  Adam Johnson from Sir E Scott School in Tarbert joined us.

Looking at how a three dimensional object can be shown in two dimensions

The National Navigation Award Scheme is a great way to introduce people to the skills of navigation in a non threatening way. It takes a stepped approached to navigation pioneered by Nigel Williams of Glenmore Lodge. By breaking the training down into easy manageable stages which can be easily related to the real world is a key component.

It is not a leading award but a recognition of your ability to navigate and there are three different levels bronze, silver and gold.

If you would like us to come and do some training with you so you can deliver the award in a school or group we would be very happy to do this just contact Isi or Tim.

Opportunity to study Learning for Sustainability

In our quest to share the resources we receive, we received an e-mail from Learning for Sustainability Scotland and the fully funded courses in Learning for Sustainability (LfS) they are offering.

The courses are being run by the British Council, University of Edinburgh and Learning for Sustainability Scotland and they are accredited by the General Teaching Council of Scotland (GTCS) and Scottish College for Educational Leadership.

They are offering a great opportunity to consider the difficulties of what Learning for Sustainability means and how do you integrate it into your practice.

Link to Fully Funded courses in Learning for Sustainability

Opportunity to study Learning for Sustainability

To look into the background of this the University web site and the Learning for Sustainability Scotland sites are both excellent resources.

If you are struggling for time, Tim can to come to schools and deliver twilight sessions on LfS as it is part of his Masters Degree.

 

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