Have you ever left your family for 2 1/2 days to stick around friends to learn about the great outdoors? At MCPS (Montgomery County Public Schools) you are required to pay around $93 to go somewhere for 2 1/2 days and experience the outdoors with no electronics. You got to do five different events which include the confidence course, nature hike, stream study, predator and prey and geo-caching. Also they had a mini buffet with a salad bar for every meal of the day. During the night you slept in cabins with other classmates but sometimes it could get pretty chaotic.
The first thing the whole 6th grade did was have to hike around the whole entire Outdoor Ed campus. This campus was shared with other people at different times so we saw a bunch of things that we weren't going to use. It was a hard hike, we climbed hills, jumped into mud and learned about that this site was part of the Civil War. Eventually we were all starving because we haven't eaten lunch yet so we wanted to finish the hike. When we were about to go inside and eat, our instructor told us we just hiked all that for nothing and the bus stop was right over there. Everyone got really mad but we were too hungry to argue we just went inside to eat.
We each were assigned groups according to last names. You stuck with your group for whatever you did. The first activity we did was called the confidence course. This is where you do a bunch of challenges that involve trust with others. Some things we did were swing on a rope, walk on planks and climbing a net. It was fun but then two hours were finished we had to go back.
Activity #2 was Predator and Prey. There you could either be a omnivore, a herbivore, a carnivore, the rabies or the medic. The herbivore run from everyone trying to survive and getting food and water stamps hidden around the forest. The omnivores hide from the carnivores but eat the herbivores. Carnivores eat herbivores and omnivores while avoiding the rabies. Rabies kill everyone and the medic can revive people. If you died three times you were out and there was a hour and half time limit to survive. I was a carnivore and thankfully survived.
My group's third activity was stream study. It was really boring because people already destroyed the equipment we were supposed to use. So we just sat there talking or going into the mud and using broken nets to fish out things. In total people caught two crayfishes that they had to return. The hike back to the campus was long because the stream was downhill and the hill was very steep.
After that activity we had to go and hike some more because we had the nature hike. Everyone was already tired at that point so no one wanted to hike anymore. We had to hike onto the Appalachian mountains so we could get even more tired. But when we hiked up we got to see someone shoot a gun, we got to go into the first completed Washington Monument and we got to learn more about the Civil War.
The last activity was geo-caching. This is where we roam around the forests in groups to do experiments. Some of the experiments were broken so we couldn't do them while others didn't have all the equipment. It got boring so me and me friends just started marching around. When we were done we got to go home.
Overall Outdoor Ed was a good experience but I eventually had to leave.
The first thing the whole 6th grade did was have to hike around the whole entire Outdoor Ed campus. This campus was shared with other people at different times so we saw a bunch of things that we weren't going to use. It was a hard hike, we climbed hills, jumped into mud and learned about that this site was part of the Civil War. Eventually we were all starving because we haven't eaten lunch yet so we wanted to finish the hike. When we were about to go inside and eat, our instructor told us we just hiked all that for nothing and the bus stop was right over there. Everyone got really mad but we were too hungry to argue we just went inside to eat.
We each were assigned groups according to last names. You stuck with your group for whatever you did. The first activity we did was called the confidence course. This is where you do a bunch of challenges that involve trust with others. Some things we did were swing on a rope, walk on planks and climbing a net. It was fun but then two hours were finished we had to go back.
Activity #2 was Predator and Prey. There you could either be a omnivore, a herbivore, a carnivore, the rabies or the medic. The herbivore run from everyone trying to survive and getting food and water stamps hidden around the forest. The omnivores hide from the carnivores but eat the herbivores. Carnivores eat herbivores and omnivores while avoiding the rabies. Rabies kill everyone and the medic can revive people. If you died three times you were out and there was a hour and half time limit to survive. I was a carnivore and thankfully survived.
My group's third activity was stream study. It was really boring because people already destroyed the equipment we were supposed to use. So we just sat there talking or going into the mud and using broken nets to fish out things. In total people caught two crayfishes that they had to return. The hike back to the campus was long because the stream was downhill and the hill was very steep.
After that activity we had to go and hike some more because we had the nature hike. Everyone was already tired at that point so no one wanted to hike anymore. We had to hike onto the Appalachian mountains so we could get even more tired. But when we hiked up we got to see someone shoot a gun, we got to go into the first completed Washington Monument and we got to learn more about the Civil War.
The last activity was geo-caching. This is where we roam around the forests in groups to do experiments. Some of the experiments were broken so we couldn't do them while others didn't have all the equipment. It got boring so me and me friends just started marching around. When we were done we got to go home.
Overall Outdoor Ed was a good experience but I eventually had to leave.
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