Training Log Archive: barb

Wednesday - took the car in order to get across town in minimal time.
Subbed for Anna S at Linnaean. This is a class of 7 girls (a couple kids were absent, so the full class is a few more). First time with epunch; we went to Radcliffe Quad. It was nearly deserted but the graduation tent was set up. It was hot, so that was perfect: start/finish in the shade under the tent, and place the controls around the perimeter. No map; just the get-controls-in-given-order game. They raced head to head on the same order, which was good, because it provided focus and they generally stuck very close to the other team (2 teams). Did it twice, and then talked some.
The girls are very talkative with each other, particularly the 5th graders. If a thought occurs to them, they will immediately turn to their friend and speak, even while I am talking. I shifted from stridently asking them to pay attention, to talking gently and pausing some.

I handed out flyers with upcoming CSU, NEOC and UNO races, and the sprint camp.

Meghan, Isla, Erisa, Shirin, Bruckty, Bodie, Grace.

Also, when I mentioned teams, the 4 5th graders immediately moved together and made it clear they wanted to be a team. I paused and talked about how that made me a little sad for the other girls - would they feel left out? After a little discussion the 3 others said they were fine being a team.
The helper was a young man named Scott; not usually assigned to our class, but Jason was absent. I asked how he got the job. He'd been working at a sporting goods store and not loving it; he knew Jason and Jason suggested he apply.

Tuesday -- set up 3 white courses (all same controls) at King Open for grades 7-8.
Bit of a whirlwind.
Up until now I have not given them confirmation when they are at the control that they are at the right one. Made a big deal of having them do the course and then check at the end if they did it right.
This time, with the control numbers on the electronic punch boxes, they got the right order. The immediate feedback is good - they can self correct on the course, which is good.
Three of the boys were particularly fast. One is heading back to India. The other two I started recruiting for 2016 Interscholastics.

Really wish we had more space. In the classes overall, some of the schools have REALLY TINY spaces! Exercises take time proportional to the area, so some classes are done and wondering what to do with exercises that fill the time for others.

Taught the 6th grade today.
We started by looking at the splits for Keegan and Harlan from last night's park-O and discussing a couple of the routes.
Then we went outside and did the same epunch game as 2 days ago with the 7th and 8th graders.
I can't believe I'm only halfway through teaching and have to come up with stuff to do for the remaining time!

C • A couple Ideas 1

This map does not look oriented to me. Am I seeing it wrong?

C • oriented 14

We had a teachers meeting last night but most could not make it. Geoff is on vacation; Sarah is ill; Anna S and Anna L had conflicts. Mike, the teacher teaching the most classes, called in, and it was good to hear his perspective. Jason Tong came and we had a good discussion; also, he brought more equipment (control flags with punches).

Isn't that a nice picture I posted?

Chasing Keegan at the Sprint.
Two of my students came to the CSU sprint today. So I doubled the number from last time. If I can keep this up, I'll have all of Cambridge in no time.

Monday night we had the first Board meeting of Navigation Games. Now we can go ahead and incorporate and apply for 501(c)3 status, and start taking donations and paying teachers and paying for kids to go orienteer. I'm hoping we can hire a director/master teacher. Our current mission is to teach Cambridge kids orienteering. On the board: Sara Mae (CSU, Saul O Sidore Foundation, well-connected in Cambridge), Julia (current Cambridge teacher), Linda (former Cambridge teacher; mentor of teachers), Katia (CSU), Deb (UNO, Ultimate Treasure Hunts), me (NEOC), Dave (NEOC).




Today I worked with the 7th and 8th graders at the King Open school. First time for them with our new epunch equipment. I used an exercise straight out of the SportIdent literature. Goal was to get kids used to running around and punching the right control. I put out 6 controls randomly in a small area. Teams each had a different order in which they needed to visit the controls (eg 33-31-35-36-32-34). First person had to run around and find the first one on the list and punch it, then run back and tag off to the next person, handing over the epunch. We repeated it 6 or 7 times. Kids were running, having fun. Then other kids who are not even in the class started coming over and asking if they could play, including some girls. (The class is currently all boys.) Yay! Epunch - might be worth the expense, in recruiting kids. The teacher, Mr. F, was inspired by how well it was going and said maybe with the 6th grade class we could aim at putting on a recruiting orienteering event for other classes by the end of the quarter, and that way recruit for the fall.


On the other hand, the teacher asked how much it cost and when I told him, he was like, oh, not gonna happen. So - how can we make much cheaper epunch setup for schools?? Could we get down to a couple hundrend dollars??? And sell a ton of them? What would it take?

The best part was just seeing these kids running as fast as they could and punching.

Oh, I think I should get a license to drive a school bus.

C • expense 4

Taught two classes yesterday at Fitzgerald. For the older kids I used a map Ed made. There were only two kids. They were very engageable. Talked about the map, and they placed controls and we ran a course and timed it.

The younger kids, K-2, worked real well.

1. Tabletop map. I used 6 objects, all the same kind of thing though different colors. Then I had maps of different arrangements of those 6 things. I had one kid arrange the things to match the map. I had another kid hide a coin under one of the things - as circled on the map, while kid #3 closed their eyes. Kid #3 opened their eyes and used the map to identify the object that had the coin under it. They liked this a lot. I like when one kid is shy and doesn't want to do it, and by the end wants to.

2. I put 3 controls on trees, 3 on fences, and 2 on benches. I used the same punch card as last week. However, last week I had stickers - and this week I used regular orienteering punches. I spent some time talking about the control and showing them how to punch before they went out. Again, they helped each other when they were done. We checked their punches. It was kind of neat that the pattern of little needle holes when you punch was somewhat similar to the maps I had been making. So the idea of looking for a certain pattern was already there.

3. After these two activities, they just played in the park for a while.

4. When we went back inside, we took up the tabletop map game again because they weren't tired of it.

Today I taught 6th grade. I really had not prepared before this morning and I had an 8am meeting at work I had to prep for so it was a rush this morning. That means I brought way too much stuff. When I'm prepared, there is less stuff to bring. Anyway, it was rainy so I brought Jason's basketball court maps. Really saved my butt, Jason doing that lesson plan. Put out cones, put them on the map, put numbers on cards next to the cones. Talked a lot about keeping the map oriented, and folding the map so you can thumb it. Watched each kid and gave feedback. Then timed them: they had to follow one of 4 courses to different cones, and keep a running total of the numbers on the cones. I practiced with them by having them do some additions before starting. They really have to think a lot and do a lot of things. We talked about how the map holding/folding becomes automatic and so frees your brain for the navigation. I encouraged them to come to Danehy on Thursday. They are busy people. Hoping to get Keegan there at least.

Oh, and I bought a school epunch kit. I'm excited. We used it today in the gym on the basketball map.

One of the things Erin said to me has been frequently on my mind these past weeks. He said he finds it works well to participate, to model activity and play.

Taught the 6th grade; focus on reading details on a map.
Took Keegan, one of them boys, to the park-O tonight. He was really really good. Talked to him about forming an Interscholastics team.

Also made punch cards for Geoff and Mike to use in their classes today.

Shadowing Keegan at CSU Park-O

One class today: grades 7 & 8.
Had them redo the 3 courses from last class, using regular paper punch controls. Paired them up - the kid who successfully did a course last time taught the kid who didn't. I took the extra kid, who I'd been warned was a troublemaker, and had violent outbursts of rage. He was lovely. Talkative, really opened up to me. In the 30 minutes we were walking around, he told me about being taken away from his family by DYS, about his mom being a drug addict so he doesn't live with her, about his experience in court, about being bullied by older foster kids, about his dad's farm in South Carolina, about his nana down there whose family steals her money. We dealt with the map and punching for a few seconds at each control and then got back to our conversation. He pointed out a girl once and said that's the one whose mother made the allegations.
The kids seemed engaged.

C • Sad 4

Three classes.

1. 6th grade at King Open. Focus was on detail, using a GIS map I printed out from Cambridge website, having only buildings and pavement. Three courses, flagging tape controls. Had to leave early to get to the next class. 5 boys, I think. Assisted by Mr. F and Ann Marie.

2. K-2 at Fitzgerald/Peabody/Rindge. 14 kids. Wore the Dr. Seuss O hat and carried an orange flag as we paraded out of the school to the park. Hugely successful activity. I made punch cards with 8 boxes. Each box displayed a clipart picture of a tree, bench or fence. They had to run around the park and find object that had stickers on it, take a sticker, put it in that place on the card. When they finished they helped others. They just all ran around doing this happily for 15-20 minutes. it was great. 12/14 had completely correct stickers. Assisted for this class and the next by Sarah and Carmelita.

3. 3-5 at Fitzgerald. Same park, but using Ed's map from before. Each person hung one control, then had to tell me where it was on the map, and then we did a course, timed, based on that. Then they wanted to put out another control each, and did another course. Did not even have time for capture the flag, which they loved doing at the end of the last two classes.

So this week I'll have taught this many classes:

Grades K-2: 2
Grades 3-5: 2
Grade 6: 1
Grades 7-8: 2
Plus a teachers' meeting.
Plus, just, working full time.
Prepping some ONA articles.
Helping with junior travel logistics/communication.
Getting Isabel set up to study and train in Europe. Fun with bureaucrats.
Taking a class.
Starting an orienteering education non-profit. We now have 8 members of the board. First meeting in a couple weeks.
Transplanted tomatoes from the basement to the great outdoors.

It is busy.

In July I will enjoy watching movies. I will enjoy that very much.

Taught at Harrington today. Pretty fun.
Regular orienteering course with the 7th and 8th graders. Throw them in, see what is hard, then pair up next time so the ones who got it can teach those who struggled.
With the kindergartners, we drew maps and then did a treasure hunt just looking for controls outside.
One stolen control today, out of 12. Urban park...

C • Stolen control 11

Taught the 6th grade class - regular orienteering courses and did Q&A with an elite orienteer (Isabel).
Left early, leaving Ann Marie and Mr F in charge, in order to get to another class at a school across town, grades 3-5. There we looked for places matching photos I'd taken, put streamers up there, and then ran courses.
In the evening, we had a meeting of the teachers plus Jason who is helping design the lesson plans. There were 6 teachers. (!) Good discussion about what is working and what is hard.

Taught the 7-8 grade. Mr F afterward suggested that there be more movement and less sitting around.

Rushed to the Fitzgerald to teach 2 more classes: K-2 and 3-5.

K-2
Circle. Boys: when I say "go", stand up, run touch a tree, run back, sit down.
etc. (worked great!)
Then the gather game, run around touching and counting trees, and when I wave the flag, come to me and tell me how many.
Then we looked for objects in the photos. (so so)
Then it was time to stop.
Idea: use 3x5 name cards (but they can't read - photos?) to make a map of where they should sit in the circle.

3-5
Draw maps from memory of school ground.
Find objects in photo cards, mark on one of the maps.
Play capture the flag (nothing to do with maps).

Green Y day 2 - Splits

Green Y Day 1 - Splits

Met up with Geoff before his first teaching gig at Harrington community school.
Mike came there because I messed up and didn't change the calendar when I changed who was teaching where.
Sadly, Mike's bike was stolen yesterday morning. He was planning on using it to get from the train station (he lives far) to each teaching gig. :-(
Anyone want to donate a bike?

C • bike 3

As a JTESC member, here are some musings on how we might spend the donations we have received, most recently and notably from Peter Gagarin's wonderful amazing marathon challenge.

In no particular order.

The money was not donated to sit in a bank account. It should be spent.

Step back and think about our goals. Erin laid out a long-term vision when he started. How are we doing relative to that vision? Is it the vision we want?
I'd like to see a broadening of the number of young orienteers. Whether your interest is seeing the US do well internationally at elite levels, or broaden opportunities for recreational orienteering, increasing the number of children and families who orienteer contributes to that.
More support for the kids who already orienteer is also key. Communication, opportunitites to train, opportunities to travel. Stronger, larger, and just more regional teams. Recruiters. (A kid in my class Wednesday attends NEOC meets - and I'd never met him!). Committees that work: Safety [yikes, Maryjane is stepping down], PR, travel support, equipment, training plans, coaching... Having a paid staffer to coordinate and keep things moving, or the right volunteer with a ton of time on their hands, would help a lot. We have good ideas but drop them.
Now I'm rambling. I meant to be simple and clear.

Long term goals:
Grow the number of young orienteers.
Support youth who are already interested in orienteering.

And to get there, there are many different approaches; we want to encourage all efforts but also coordinate and guide where appropriate.
* O in schools
* Teach teachers how to teach orienteering
There are good models
* WIOL
* ARK
* Many programs in other countries.
* Residential training for elite juniors as with the poles francais
* Summer camps
* Focus on college teams

Other thoughts about how to proceed, aside from goals and specific program ideas:
* Get community input on ideas. AP. Call stakeholders. Gather information.
* JTESC should not dither for a long time but rather respect the donors by doing the work to come up with a plan (or plans) reasonably efficiently. Like within a couple months.
* Support what is already working and has people doing it, but where money would make a difference. Inventing and starting from scratch is great, but would take longer.
* Focus on sustainability: once spent, what is the plan for continuing?