I’ll admit right from the start it was the BBC’s kids program Balamory that reminded me of this one.

Now anyone can get the kids running about on a treasure hunt with a little preparation beforehand but it’s an ideal opportunity to get them learning something.

Every year the BBC runs Spring Watch and Autumn Watch in conjunction with its main channels and its children’s channels. It usually entails one man hiding out on a Hebridean island watching out for seals and a few more hiding in a portacabin full of screens showing the feeds from the various nests they planted cameras in. One of the things PC Plum has the kids doing is going out and spotting various animals and marking them down in their notepad whilst telling them a wee bit about each animal.

Taking this and mixing it up with the traditional treasure hunt can have the kids enjoying themselves and at the same time causing them much distress when they find out they’ve actually learned something as well.

Our local park has a petting zoo where the kids can run about as much as they want but each cage has a small plaque telling you something about the animal. Pick 10 animals and give the kids some pens and paper and send them off to find them all. Obviously some kids are going to want to ‘win’ that bit more than the others and finish the hunt before everyone else so why not get them to find out the most interesting thing they can about each animal on the list. That way its not about who gets back first but who put in the most effort to learn about the animals that might win the prize.

Obviously that limits the hunt to those kids that can read and write but theres plenty of ways to get the younger kids joining in or even tailoring the game so they can play on a more even footing. How about having them photograph the items as well as added proof that they did actually find everything on the list. I’d draw the line at that though as I think forcing them to appear in the photo with that days paper on show may be taking it a bit to seriously.

Keeping with the nature theme you could have them find as many different kinds of trees as possible and in the autumn you could score it by having them pick up the leaves.

Anyone else do something similar or have any ideas for other themes for the hunts?