, and be sure
to type “GAME
FILE” in the subject header! By Leslie Helliwell, Child-at-Heart
As outdoor educators, we all must find ways to guide our students’ desire to play outdoors into learning experiences that will help bring about our goals as educators, whether the goal is to bring the group together, create interest, burn off excess energy, tie their interests into our lesson, reward the group with something just for fun, or really get a concept across in a kinesthetic way. Games can be a great part of any outdoor educator’s back of tricks, be they educational, fillers, team-builders, or energy-killers. Unfortunately, it’s easy to fall into a “game rut,” where we play the same six games over and over, bored to tears, wishing we had fresh material to spice up our programs. What is a poor OE instructor to do?
Be bored no more! AEOE is compiling an ONLINE GAME FILE to allow us to trade ideas year-round, instead of just at conferences! With the click of a mouse, you will be able to pick the brains of your colleagues from around the state. It’s cheap! It’s easy! And it’s a fun way for our community to interact, even if it is in cyberspace!
As a teambuilding activity, I challenge every member site to come up with one or two (or three or fifty) games to contribute to the Game File. Submissions will be accepted via email, as inline text, Word documents, or PDF files. In order to make it easy on the eyes, we ask that your submission be formatted thusly:
The more people who get involved, the better this resource will be! I know everyone has an idea rattling around in their gourd as they read this, so get crackin! There are already a few games up on the AEOE website-check them out and get involved!
Submissions can be emailed to
, and be sure
to type “GAME
FILE” in the subject header!