School Games Event at Capstone Farm Country Park
On the 11th of May 2023 Saxons Orienteering working together with the School Games Organiser for Medway hosted 100 Year 8 students from 7 Medway Secondary Schools at Capstone Farm Country Park for an orienteering competition.
Across the county we are seeing increased interest in delivering orienteering activities within schools as part of efforts to get outdoors and help students choose healthier behaviours and attitudes. Thanks to an initiative of Claire Moore the Medway School Games Organiser, Saxons agreed to organise an inaugural School Games Event at Capstone Farm Country Park.
Capstone was being mapped as part of the Find Your Way project to promote Virtual Orienteering opportunities within local country parks and open spaces across the county. The newly mapped area also proved an ideal location for the Medway schools competition, and Medway council have been hugely supportive of both initiatives.
After much careful planning, and thanks to the support of several Saxon volunteers as well as some student leaders form The Hundred of Hoo School, the year 8 students arrived at Capstone for the days activities. Whilst some had received some orienteering skills training within school, a lot of the students were completly new to the sport and so the first objective of the day was to brief the students, show them the equipment, talk them through maps, and practice map orientation. Next up, the students, competing in groups of 4 set off on their first course. I had planned 2 yellow courses each with a few gaffles to prevent following, and the teams were distributed across the courses and variations.
Some of the teams took to the sport like ducks to water and we had our first finishers from Leigh Academy in just over 20 minutes. Other teams took a little longer to get to grips with the skills and the course marshals had to provide some guidance to help the teams around the courses, however everyone made it back safely for a break and some lunch. Before embarking on the second course, everyone got to have a go at the Maze O competition which we had set up with some of the students trying multiple times to set the fastest times! The teams were then set off on their second course, with most a lot more comfortable with the skills required, and some very fast times were set.
Finally it came to prize giving, with the winning teams being the fastest over the two courses. The winning boys team was the Hundred of Hoo B-team, and the winning girls team was from Rainham School for Girls B-team, (with Rainham actually being 24 seconds faster than the winning boys!)
Thanks to all who participated, and we hope to be back for 2024.
Rainham Mark Grammer
St John Fisher
Hundred of Hoo
Leigh Academy
Rainham School for Girls
Rochester Independent College
Holcombe Grammer Boys