Experiential Class Preparation
Fun, age-appropriate activities guide students through the basics of maps, compass, navigation, teamwork, and the lifetime sport of orienteering. Inside-school and outside-on-school-grounds treasure hunts give students real practice of actual navigation on familiar grounds, and is good preparation for the upcoming field trip.

Field Trip
At Eagle Creek Park, students embark on a real treasure hunt, where teams use map and compass, and their new-found navigation/orienteering skills, to locate checkpoints in the park, that are marked on their map.

Teams work together to locate the clue data at each checkpoint. The data they collect helps them to solve a puzzle, which allows them to open a treasure chest! Students rotate different leadership roles as they make decisions and problem solve, while walking through the park as a team.

Fun, Safe Activity
Team Navigation!™ is a FUN way to experience group learning. It requires NO minimum fitness level, nor a background in navigation or orienteering. Walking is the only physical activity (unless a sport coach wants the students to be runnning!), and we provide all necessary advance preparation and training. We will identify suggested clothing & footwear considerations.

Integration of Indiana Academic Standards
Sciences: Connects lab work to field application and environmental stewardship, practical application of scales, comparing old vs new technology, making decisions based on evidence (scientific method)
Geography: Identification of local and internatinoal map symbols, legends, scales
Mathematics: Using mental calculations and estimations, practical application of measurment systems, devleoping and adjusting strategies to solve problems
Physical Education: Introduces a new lifetime sport (orienteering), integrates movement, social interaction, and challenges
Social Studies: Exploring new communities, group behavior, attitudes, and actions
Language Arts: Listening, paraphrasing, persuation, reading comprehension, word recognition, darafting narrative applications

Example Past Team Navigation!™ Youth Programs (see photo gallery)

October 30, 31, November 2, 2006
Program Clark Pleasant Intermediate School. About 120 fifth graders + 35 parents from this school in Greenwood, participated int the 3-day TrueNorth Team Navigation!™ program

October 23, 23, 26, 2006
Program: Clark Pleasant Intermediate School.. About 120 fifth graders + 35 parents from this school in Greenwood, participated int the 3-day TrueNorth Team Navigation!™ program

October 21, 2006
Program: The Children's Museum of Indianapolis had a Halloween-O Family Program at Eagle Creek Park, where families were introduced to Team Navigation!™.

October 14-15, 2006
Program: The Children's Museum of Indianapolis hired TrueNorth to make maps & develop a Team Navigation!™ program in conjunction with the MAPS: Tools for Adventure Exhibit, sponsored by National Geographic. Coates faciliated family treasure hunts on opening weekend of the exhibit.

October 9, 10, 12, 2006
Program: Clark Pleasant Intermediate School. About 120 fifth graders + 35 parents from this school in Greenwood, participated int the 3-day TrueNorth Team Navigation!™ program

October 7, 2006
Program: Project WAVES, near Lawrenceburg, IN. TrueNorth facilitated a Family Team Navigation!™ program for almost 60 family members at Gladys Russell Nature Preserve.

June 24, 2006
Program: DINO Youth Adventure Camp. TrueNorth volunteered for Doing Indiana Outdoors Summer Youth Adventure Camp, & offered a couple morning sessions youth Team Navigation!™.

June 23 & 30, 2006
Program: Forest Glen Nature Camp. Summer day campers participated in a fun, interactive session of TrueNorth Team Navigation!™ during their summer camp.

May 20, 2006
Program: Wiuldlfe Festival, Forest Glen School mer day campers participated in a fun, interactive session of TrueNorth Team Navigation!™ during their summer camp.

May 13, 2006
Carmel, IN: Birthday party using TrueNorth Team Navigation!™!

May 8, 10, 11, 2006
Program: Forest Glen Elementary. The entire 5th grade participated in the 3-day TrueNorthTeam Navigation!™program, that involved 2-days of training at their school, in preparation for the field trip to Eagle Creek Park.

April 19, 2006
Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis
Program: Craig Middle School. The entire 7th grade participated in a Team Navigation!™ program at Eagle Creek Park

October 23, 2005
Gladys Russel Nature Preserve, Lawrenceburg, IN
Program: WAVES program, facilitated by Cynthia Merrill. Youth outdoor program Truenorth was invited back and presented a navigation clinic, a treasure hunt, and an orienteering meet at this newly mapped property.

September 18, 2005
Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis
Program: Berne Evangelical Mennonite Church, Ft. Wayne IN. The youth ministry integrated church principles with navigation principles during their Team Navigation!™ activity at Eagle Creek Park.

September 11, 2005
Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis
Program: St. Michael's Jr. High Youth Group, Greenfield IN, "Who's Navigating Your Life" This youth program integrates Catholic principles into their youth programs. This Team Navigation!™ activity incorporated how to work with new peers, following vs leading, visualizing where you want to go, constant checking of your moral compass, making decisions under peer pressure, how to react to mistake

July 30, 2005
Gladys Russel Nature Preserve, Lawrenceburg, IN
Program: WAVES program, facilitated by Cynthia Merrill. Youth outdoor program Truenorth presented a navigation clinic, a treasure hunt, and an orienteering meet at this newly mapped property.

June-July 2005
Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis
Program: Summer Youth Day Camp, ages 6-8, 9-11, 12 and over
Weekly Team Navigation!™ Treasure Hunt with one of the age groups, culminating with a combined Treasure Hunt at the end of the summer program

November 4, 2004
Convention Center, downtown Indianapolis
National Science Teacher's Association National Area Convention, 2-hour workshop, "Which Way Do We Go?, Preparing an Adventure Navigation Program for Your Students"

October 7, 2004
Eagle Creek Park, Indianapolis
School: Ben Davis High School, Ms. Helbling 6 Earth Science classes
Approximately 160 students and 30+ parents & adult chaperones navigated with map & compass in groups of 3-4 through Eagle Creek Park

October 5, 2004
Ben Davis High School, Indianapolis
School: Ben Davis High School, Ms. Helbling Earth Science classes
All six Earth Science classes learned to navigate on their school grounds, using map, compass and cooperative learning techniques. The teams & format was identical to their upcoming field trip at Eagle Creek Park.

August 31, 2004
Eagle Creek Park, NW side of Indianapolis, IN
Youth Group: Peace Learning Center Staff
Approximately 30 staff from the Peace Learning Center (PLC) participated in a 1/2 day of TrueNorth Team Navigation! adventures, as part of their staff training/teambuilding. The PLC staff work with IPS 4th and 6th graders throughout the school year, engaging them in conflict resolution trainings.

May 29, 2004
Eagle Creek Park, NW side of Indianapolis, IN
Youth Group: Compass Leadership Academy
Approximately eighty 3rd and 4th graders from Pike and Washington Township will participate in a morning Treasure Hunt, using the skills they learned at their school activity. Teams of youth will navigate through Eagle Creek Park, using map & compass, looking for checkpoints and solving puzzles for prizes !

April 24, 2004
Central Elementary (Pike Township)
Youth Group: Compass Leadership Academy
Approximately forty 3rd & 4th graders from Pike Township will participate adventure activities such map drawing, reading map symbols, & a school scavenger hunt to prepare them for a Adventure Navigation field trip to Eagle Creek Park on May 29

April 10, 2004
Fox Hill Elementary (Washington Township)
Youth Group: Compass Leadership Academy
Approximately forty 3rd & 4th graders from Washington Township will participate adventure activities such map drawing, reading map symbols, & a school scavenger hunt to prepare them for a Adventure Navigation field trip to Eagle Creek Park on May 29

Compass Leadership Academy is a prevention and early intervention program that seeks to narrow the achievement gap for young boys identified as being “at-risk” of under-achievement, social exclusion, and/or poor behavioral choices.

Special Fall 2003 Team Navigation!™ Youth Project
Over 600 Students learned basics of Orienteering in Fall 2003 !
TrueNorth & Associates engaged 3 local high schools & an elementary school in teaching over 600 students how to navigate during the months of September and October 2003.
Sept 29-Oct 2: Ben Davis High School Earth Science classes
October 6-13: Pike High School Navy JROTC classes
October 14-17: Avon High School Earth Science classes
October 27,28, 30: Whiteland Elementary School 5th grade class
At each school we spent several days in the classroom preparing the students for a week-ending field trip to Eagle Creek Park for an orienteering field trip. This allowed many young people and adults to learn the fundamentals of moving with map and compass, as well as have a valuable team experience in learning the different roles in group navigation. The classroom instruction followed a progression of learning & cooperative learning methodologies, where the students experience role playing, leadership & decision-making interaction. Classroom activities & the field trip follow a learn-by-doing approach !

• See the Photo Gallery for pictures of the above school orienteering adventure programs.
• If you have a school class or youth group, and are interested in how to have an Orienteering Adventure field trip, contact Jeff Coates at truenorth360@comcast.net
  
  See Below for brief descriptions of recent High School, and elementary programs, and girl scout programs
  
  High-School-Age Team Navigation!™ Program Example
  Ben Davis High School
  After involving her Connecticut students in an orienteering session, Earth Science teacher Ms. Helbling decided when she arrived here in Indiana she wanted to have her 10-11-12 grade Hoosier students to also learn the basics of moving with map & compass. So she contacted TrueNorth and we custom-designed a week-long educational session that combined classroom activities with a field trip to Eagle Creek Park on the west-side of Indianapolis. See more photos & examples in the School/Youth Programs Photo Gallery.
  "A Test in the Woods", Oct 26, 2002 article in Indy Star)
  
  
  Elementary-Age Program Example
  Whiteland Elementary School
  Newspaper Article
  Over 115 fifth grade students completed 2 days of in-school interactive instruction, preparing them for a 1/2 day orienteering adventure field trip to Eagle Creek Park ! Click on these example photos for more photos !
  
  
  Washington Township COMPASS Mentoring Program (CMP)
  CMP is a prevention and early intervention program that seeks to narrow the achievement gap for 4th grade boys identified as being "at-risk" of underachievement, social exclusion, or poor behavioral choices. TrueNorth prgrammed a school scavenger hunts at Fox Hill Elementary and Crooked Creek Elementary, & a treasure hunt at Eagle Creek Park for these youngsters ! See more photos in the School/Youth Programs Photo Gallery.
  

Scout Program Examples
Brownie Troop 1476 wanted to have a team activity that combined their Finding Your Way Badge, with the Bridging Ceremonies. Here in April 2003 the girls show off their Treasure Chest find !

Reasons to Consider a Team Navigation!™ experience
Teaching youth basic navigational skills is a great fit for elementary, middle, or high school curriculum or athletic teams.. It fits well with science, math, social studies, ROTC, or physical education. It involves students:

• working together as a team
• group decision-making, problem-solving, self-confidence
• learning about the different kinds of maps
• using estimations
• mental calculations
• estimating and measuring distances
• converting from metric to standard measurement
• learning map symbols
• pacing distances based from map scales
• taking compass bearings (with & without a map)
• determining declination
• visualizing interpretation of map symbols to real terrain features
• interpreting aerial perspectives
• solving spatial relationship problems
• walking in a park, etc.

It's Fun Too!

What a better way to learn, than to get kids out of the traditional classroom and in the out-of-doors ! With a Treasure Hunt or Scavenger Hunt format, there is excitement in the air as the students try to find as many checkpoints in the timeframe! And there are prizes for their accomplishments ! But they have to use the tools, navigational skills, and each other to accomplish their goals !

Example School Format
We teach "tools-in-a-tool-belt" approach. Using a pedagogy that starts with fun activities, moves to basic review of fundamentals, and ends with a FUN reward for the students! We emphasize keeping the students moving to learn.

We start with simple mapping activities, move to a scavenger hunt at the school, and progress to a field trip to a local park. We introduce the simple basics of navigation: keeping the map oriented and reading map symbols.

The students learn how to draw a map, & learn the navigating elements of symbols, legends/keys, and the north arrow. We'll relate this section to a typical road map. We will play some games with these homemade maps, and with high school groups we move to a real orienteering map. It works well to transfer the navigational learnings from the fun in-school scavenger hunts to learning how to read a topo map of a local park. We have games and worksheets to help with this.

The final preparation step is letting the kids learn how to operate a compass & learning how to carry a compass. High school students learn how to take "bearings" ("put fred in the shed") with and without a map. We teach the compass as a secondary navigating skill, as the primary skills involve the reading of the map. We supply the compasses and get the kids up and moving to do these activities.

Finally, the kids are ready to go outside and use an orienteering map and compass to locate "checkpoints" placed in the park. At the park, we'll review the "tools in a tool-belt" approach, where the kids have to choose which tools and skills they've learned to to orienteer in groups using clue sheets, topo maps, compasses, answer sheets, and punch cards.

Team/Group Navigation
Even though navigation & orienteering can be individual skills, we use navigating teams. With the team only having one map, one compass, one clue/answer sheet, this is a powerful format for group decision-making and decisions. We identify roles, but the team members must rotate roles, and decide who does what. The size of the team may be dictated by the number of adult volunteers. The best size would be 3.

Added Twists
If the teacher or coach approves, we can also have "trivia questions" placed at each "checkpoint", where students are asked to answer a special designed trivia questions once they navigate to find the checkpoint. We've also had special challenges at checkpoints, where groups have had to perform an activity, & take a picture with a polaroid camera to prove they completed the challenge.

Other options involve inflatable animals being placed at checkpoints, and a cumulative point system can be developed to help determine winners. At the end of the orienteering, special word puzzles can be designed, where students have to break the code & solve a phrase or riddle to determine the location of the key to the treasure chest. There are lots of creative ways to make the learning experience a fun adventure!!

Experiential, Group-Based Learning
The above ideas are fun ways to have students physically move around and learn, by using all 5 senses. They will also be given forced team experiences of different sized teams, where they will also have individual quiet time to prepare their thoughts to their team. They will learn by touching real maps, making their own maps, working together as a team to navigate to team goals, learning to "read" a map, actually using a map and compass to move to a real destination, experiencing why orienting the map is so important, learning what map symbols mean, understanding map scales, etc.

Scavenger Hunt Parties
Scavenger Hunt Parties are a FUN format for kids (and adults!) birthday parties and/or special occasions!

For birthday parties or special events, TrueNorth would create a “scavenger-hunt” map the day before the party, & the children would use that map to run around finding hidden markers ! The scavenger-hunt can be designed with any special theme desired (Survivor, Amazing Race, Indiana Jones, Captain Hook, etc). TrueNorth associates will design a special treasure-hunt map showing hidden clues around your yard/house/neighborhood. After a brief walk-through explanation on how to use the special map, and hints about working together, the kids are off searching for the clues in small groups. When all the clues are gathered, they work as an overall team to piece together a puzzle. It really is FUN !

Contact TrueNorth & Associates:
Email: truenorth360@comcast.net
Phone: (317) 876-1871