The P5, P6 & P7 Inter-school Orienteering Festival takes place at Vogrie Country Park on the 6^th of May 2015. This year the Festival will be open to all Primary Schools in Midlothian and East Lothian.

The main aims of the Festival are to:

• Have fun!
• Promote alternative physical activity in the outdoors
• Provide an opportunity for pupils to compete in the sport of orienteering
• Further increase pupils’ understanding of maps
• Experience skills for learning and skills for life
• Meet pupils from other schools

Festival information:

• Schools can enter P5, P6 & P7 classes
• There will be 3 different Orienteering courses suited to the ability of each class
• There will be no charge for this event
• Each school is responsible for arranging the transport of pupils to and from Vogrie Country Park
• Each class can expect to be involved in Orienteering activities for about an hour
• There will be no tuition on the day and it is expected participating students will have received tuition in their school grounds or at a CATO event
• Schools will be asked to attend either a morning or afternoon time slot within school hours
• Before or after the Orienteering Event schools can avail of other opportunities at Vogire Country Park – e.g. Orienteering warm up activities (staffed by Outdoor Learning) or Adventure Playground, Woodland walks – these should be fully organised and supervised by attending school staff
• The winner of the fastest P5 pupil, P6 pupil, P7pupil, School and Authority will be announced after the event

To enter:

• To enter please email me (eoin.keane@midlothian.gov.uk) the name of the school, the number of classes, the class size and the number of adults that will be attending by the 27^th of March 2015
• Once all interested schools have replied, further information will follow

Other resources and events:

• A couple of interesting booklets for coaching orienteering in primary schools have recently become available on the internet, one from Sweden click hereand the other from New Zealand click here.  Both are worth browsing through for ideas
• This year the World Orienteering Championships is taking place in Inverness – for more information click here

Fantastic work from all the S5/S6 pupils from Penicuik High who joined pupils from Secondary Schools in East Lothian on Pupils Winter Hill Walking Skills weekend based in the fantastic Cairngorm National Park.

Click here for more images

The groups raised there awareness and skills for walking in the winter environment including;

• Safe travel on snow
• Avalanche Awareness & Transceiver Use
• Weather
• Use of ice axes and crampons
• Shelter building
• Navigation

A packed weekend in amazing conditions. Great teamwork including cooking some hearty mountain meals!!  Thanks to our friends in East Lothian Outdoor Learning for all the support.

We still have some places left on our  CPD Winter Hillwalking Skills Course click here for details.