Wolf Paws on the Path Adventure
Adventure Goal: Helps Wolfs develop their hiking skills and introduces navigation.
Complete Requirements 1-5. Requirements 6 and 7 are optional.
- Show you are prepared to hike safely in any outdoor setting by putting together the Cub Scout Six Essentials to take along on your hike.
- Tell what the buddy system is and why we always use it in Cub Scouts. Describe what you should do if you get separated from your group while hiking.
- Choose the appropriate clothing to wear on your hike based on the expected weather.
- Before hiking, recite the Outdoor Code and the Leave No Trace Principles for Kids with your leader. (This may be combined with Requirement 3 of The Call of the Wild Adventure.) After hiking, discuss how you showed respect for wildlife.
- Go on a 1-mile hike with your den or family. Find two interesting things that you've never seen before and discuss with your den or family.
- Name two birds, two insects, and/or two other animals that live in your area. Explain how you identified them.
- Draw a map of an area near where you live using common map symbols. Show which direction is north on your map.
Ideas for Adventure Requirements:
- Review the hiking essentials and discuss that some items may be more important at different times of year or locations.
- The buddy system is part of the Safe Swim Defense and Safety Afloat training. Scouts should use the buddy system whenever they are outdoors, regardless of the activity.
- Scouts should memorize S - T - O - P. More info about being lost can be found here.
- We often discuss cold and wet weather, but dry and hot can be just as dangerous. Learn more about hiking clothes, sun danger, and hot weather hiking.
- The Outdoor Code is easier to remember if you start with memorizing the Four Cs - Clean, Careful, Considerate, and Conservation-minded. The best way to respect wildlife is to leave them alone and leave nothing behind.
- Plan out the hike. You can use this Hiking Trip Plan to prepare.
- At a den meeting, scouts could create a three-part list of all the birds, insects, and animals they can think of and see which list is longest. Then, circle those that live in your area. For those circled names, ask what physical characteristic helps identify it - size, color, sound, track, ...
- Scouts could make a map of their schoolyard, neighborhood, or scout meeting location from memory.
Den Meeting Ideas for Paws on the Path Adventure:
- You could go on a Rock, Paper, Scissors Hike just for fun.
- Use Point North activity to help scouts get a feel for directions.
- Play Buddy Tag.
- Tell Buddy System minute.
- Do Critter Creations activity.
- The LNT Principles for Kids are listed in the back of the Wolf Handbook. Read details of the principles and implementing them at LNT.org and Outdoor Ethics.
- Learn more about LNT from Leave No Trace Dude.
- Learn more about Hiking from Hiking Dude.
- Learn map reading and compass skills.
- Use the Map Test to review map symbols, but don't expect Wolfs to know them all.
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