Camp Themes

Beavers are the foundation of Scouting in the UK & Canada, although the youngest section has other names around the world including Joeys and Keas. We suggest the following activities to help them get into the theme of Scouting, and to start their #skillsforlife journey.

Building on Scouting skills developed in the youngest section, Cubs can get really involved in the Scouting theme; here are some suggested activities and links to an appropriate badge.

Scouts is where the Scouting theme really comes into its own, almost if it was tailor made for them. Building on the Outdoor skills gained from Beavers and Cubs, Scouts experience the confidence to be able to fend for themselves with minimal interference from grown ups.

Explorers and Young Leaders are in the unique position when it comes to a Scouting themed camp, as they can both show off the skills they have learnt along the way, through educating their peers or leading the younger sections to develop those important #skillsforlife.

For this theme we suggest that Explorers and Young Leaders can partake in both the Scouts level activities, but obviously bigger and better, with more flames and more bacon, as well as supporting the camp organisers & helpers (see below).

Scouting themed camping can be a huge energy consumer as the young people get deep into the Scouting themed activities, so we propose the following meal schedule.

Whilst we will propose menu ideas on other themes, as we write them, Scouting themed camps should be youth led. The young people should be involved in the menu selection, as with the activities above, they should be involved in some elements of the preparation & cooking (we know, scary huh?).

Download the Nico Stamping font to get the correct harry potter style font, I used a mail merge to fill in the names and address on both the letter and envelope.

“We bought packs of parchment paper to print on to, to give it the right look and feel. All letters were then wax stamped and hand delivered which the kids really loved. We also used the parchment paper and font to print things like the menu, tent lists etc.”

Create House Point jars using big sweet jars (free from our local newsagent) and printed House logos

Large badges to mark out the House tables to recreate the great hall, and if your budget runs to it, you can get large house banners online for above each table.

Water bottle labels – We stuck the labels to our drinks water barrels.

Tent numbers – we used these around the site so everyone knew which tent they were in.

Depending how creative you and your team are there are a wealt of creative resources on the likes of PInterest & Instructibles

Fluffy

3 leaders link together to create Fluffy (3 headed dog) and try and stop the YP from getting tennis balls across the room, if they catch them that person is out of the challenge.

Devil’s Snare

Is a game of Musical statues:

• Young people move around (dancing, hopping, skipping, running) while the music is playing and to freeze into a statue when the music stops.
• Tell him to remain like a statue until the music starts again.
• Randomly stop and start the music by pressing and releasing the pause button on your CD player.
• Anyone moving whilst the music is stopped is caught in the Devil’s Snare

Collect the Keys

You will need a lock with a working key (and something for the lock to open like a chest) and then 9 spares keys that all look similar. Hide the keys with varying degrees of challenge based on the section, around your site.

Wizards Chess

For Beavers we suggest changing this out for Giant Connect 4 and the YP had to beat one of the leaders for Cubs & Scouts a Garden sized-chess set version might work.

The Mirror of Erised

Spray paint a stone bright red (like the philosophers stone) and hide it along with a mirror in a wooded area. Suspend the stone in a tree above the mirror so they need to look into the mirror on the floor to be able to see the Philosophers Stone.

The example below was used as a Riddle Challenge, it’s a thought-provoking problem involving the Grain, Chicken & Fox and getting them across a river. There are a number of ways you could make this an interesting experience and Potterfying it, by making the man Hagrid and replacing the fox and Chickens with Fantastic Beasts

The Question

A man has to get a fox, a chicken, and a sack of corn across a river.
He has a rowboat, and it can only carry him and one other thing.
If the fox and the chicken are left together, the fox will eat the chicken.
If the chicken and the corn are left together, the chicken will eat the corn.
How does the man do it?

The solution is linked to in Files and Resources towards the bottom of this page

Other similer logic problem solving puzzles could also be used.

There are loads of resources online to show how this works. Use 500ml plastic bottles filled with sand and then use dowelling with a sewing hoop glue to it to create the big hoops, It was then all sprayed in gold.

We suggest using big cups and a ping pong ball for the pong part of the game. Make one of the cups a golden snitch cup worth more points than the other cups.

Each house was put into pairs and each pair takes it in turns to play another pair from a different house. Each game was timed and all scoring ping pong balls convert to their house points.

Points were awarded for the time it took to complete the course as a team.                                                                                                  

• The Ring/Resurrection Stone – I use a ring with a gem on it that I got from the dollar/pound store.
• Tom Riddle’s Diary – Cheap stationery journal book                               
• Hufflepuff’s Cup – Use a coffee mug that I got from the craft store, and with glitter glue, I wrote on the cup “Hufflepuff”.                                                                                                                    
• Slytherin’s Locket – Locket that I got from the craft store.
• Ravenclaw’s Diadem – Plastic tiara.
• Nagini – Plastic/Rubber/Soft Toy snake.
• Harry Potter – Framed picture of Harry Potter.                                                                                                                         

Making Slime!

Planting some Cress or Sunflower seeds to take home

Trip to the onsite Tuck Shop.

Make your own ‘Have you seen this wizard’ photo booth. For example create a big cardboard cut out for the surround and then lots of extra bits for the kids to hold up.