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Camouflage!

Animals have tricky ways to stay hidden in nature. This is called camouflage. Some animals use colour to blend in to their environment, and some use bright colours to stand out or confuse other animals. Other animals can become very small or very large to hide from danger. It’s time to change up your hide-and-seek game. Imitate some of nature’s best hiders and try to blend in to your environment in this camouflage game.

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Plan

  • Where will you do this adventure? Make sure there are plenty of places to hide.
  • What are the boundaries of your space?
  • What are some of the tricks that animals use to hide?
  • What can you do to blend into your surroundings?
  • How will you decide who is “it”? How will you mark the spot?
  • How will you decide where the person who is “it” must stand?

Do

  • The person who is “it” must stand in one spot for each round. He or she can turn around, but cannot leave the spot.
  • At the start of the round, everyone must be touching the arm of the person who is “it”.
  • During the first round, the person who is “it” closes her eyes and counts to 20 loud enough so that everyone can hear. While she is counting, the players run away and find a hiding spot.
  • After counting to 20, the person who is “it” opens her eyes and tries to find the players without moving from their spot. She should identify players by their clothes.
  • When the person who is “it” cannot find anyone else, she closes her eyes and counts to 15. Players now have to move closer to the person who is “it” and find a new hiding spot.
  • After 15 seconds, the person who is “it” opens her eyes to look for players.
  • The person who is “it” counts to 10 during the third round, while players keep moving closer.
  • After the 10-second round, the person who is “it” yells “Back to the pond!” and all of the players who are still hiding run to tag her. The first person to tag the person who is “it” will be “it” for the next game.

Review

  • What do you know now that you did not know before?
  • What made a good hiding spot?
  • How do you think animals hide in the wild?
  • How do you think you could blend in better with your surroundings?
  • What elements of STEM were in this adventure? Science? Technology? Engineering? Mathematics?
  • What did you like about this adventure? What did you not like? How would you do this adventure differently?
  • Remember to submit your activities on our Scouts for Sustainability Take Action Map

Keep it Simple

  • Start by playing some games such as hide and seek and see how hard it is to camouflage yourself.

Take it Further

  • Look at other animals in environments that are different from ours such as tropical environments.