Orienteering and Spelling

This event was structured to offer visiting pupils a combination of academic and outdoor experiences, through a competitive Spelling Bee and Orienteering around campus

Aims

The main aim of this project was to bring together local schools to compete in a spelling competition to stretch their Year 3/4 pupils. The orienteering element was to share our extensive facilities and offer visiting pupils the opportunity to explore our sixteen acres in a safe and controlled environment

Whilst the children attending the session would immediately benefit, their teacher remarked that by giving them more confidence it would make them more able to share their experience with other pupils back in school therefore broadening the benefit.

Background

RGS have partnershiped with Hartlebury First School before and we knew through previous discussions, that they were interested in stretching their pupils spelling and interested in a Georgraphy activity; they were specificually invited along to this workshop.

Resources

For it to run successfully we needed to ensure that a sports hall was available to stage the Spelling Bee and that the chidren were prepared for all weathers for the orienteering

The event was run on the day by our Assistant Head Co-curricular and our Head of English supported by the Outreach Officer.

The financial contribution from RGS was £145 which covered catering, giveaways, transport and certificates.

Impact

Each school attending an Outreach Event is asked to complete a feed back form which is then used to inform furture events and how to improve them.

Comments received from Hartlebury Teachers were

‘It was a fantastic introduction to orienteering and fitted really well into our Geography curriculum. One of our young girls reported that she didn’t know she could spell so well which was fantastic for her confidence, thank you!’

Pupil Involvement

The thirty six pupils in attendance were from Years three and four and were a mixture of girls and boys.

Frequency

This was the first such event but due to its success and support to the state school curriculum it will be repeated in the coming academic year with perhaps the Spelling Bee beconing a Regional Competition?