You will want to have something to prevent you from getting lost, of course. A GPS is fine, but not as much fun as a map, which the child is encouraged to use (perhaps after<\/em> getting lost – you gotta have some sense of adventure after all.) This is where the expensive web-enabled smart phone or tablet becomes more than just an overpriced toy too, since it can be used to produce more information about whatever you might find – lacking one of these (and as far as I’m concerned, more power to you,) you can take notes about such things to check out when you get back.<\/p>\n We all love exploring, and this is a simple way to exploit your child’s interests, as well as giving them a little control that they may well be frustrated about (since, in case you’ve forgotten, it’s a long wait to adulthood.) You, on the other hand, are challenged to point out anything interesting that you might encounter, and to find answers to your child’s questions – as well as learning a little more about your area yourself. Much more interactive for you and your kid than soccer, more personal, and cheaper too.<\/p>\n Try it out, develop some variations, and use it to expand your activities. And of course, feel free to come back and tell me how it works, and what I missed ;-)<\/p>\n Have fun!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Okay, this one’s for the parents of children aged, I dunno, four to sixteen or so. Use your own judgment. It stems from some thoughts provoked by another post that will be coming up eventually, and seems to me to be a fun parent\/child activity that can spur some scientific and learning interest as well. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[982,981,980],"class_list":["post-6426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-random","tag-exploring","tag-parent-child-activities","tag-quality-time"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6426\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/wading-in.net\/walkabout\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/compass2.jpg\" "\\"compass2\\"")
Here’s another fun item to bring along:<\/strong> a halfway decent mapping compass. Know about magnetic declination<\/a> for your area, and shoot some sightings on whatever interesting landmarks you might spot. Learn the basics of triangulation<\/a>, and then you and your kid can figure out just what you were seeing when you get back and trace those lines-of-sight. For this, you might want some decent topo maps<\/a> of your area. The compass is also good for quizzes about direction of travel, using the sun for navigation, and various geographic activities.<\/p>\n