Amelia’s aeroplane Olympics

Before you begin

• Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Additional help to carry out your risk assessment, including examples can be found here. Don’t forget to make sure all young people and adults involved in the activity know how to take part safely.
• Make sure you’ll have enough adult helpers. You may need some parents and carers to help if you’re short on helpers

Setting up the activity

1. Mark out a starting line and throwing space.
2. Depending on the size of the group, you may want to create a space for waiting or for crafting paper aeroplanes, too. This allows people to amend their designs each time, too.
3. Create a score sheet to mark down where people’s planes fly to and how many points that get. You could split people into small groups, make score sheets and have them write down their own score after each round.
4. Alternatively, one or two volunteers (or young leaders) could monitor the points distance and write it down.
5. Use a tape measure and set out cones or markers for every 1 m from the throwing line. Mark out in metres until the other side of your meeting place or throwing space.
6. In this game, each metre will count as 10 points, so 2 m is 20 points, 3 m is 30 points and so on.
7. Extra points can be given out for creativity or teamwork, too.
8. Set out paper and craft materials on a table for people to make their paper aeroplanes with.
9. Make a few printed copies of the sheets from the ‘How to make a paper aeroplane’ section of this page and distribute them across the craft tables for people to use.

Introduce the activity

1. Gather everyone in a circle.
2. Ask if anyone has heard of Amelia Earhart and who she is or what she did. Choose a few people to answer if anyone has put their hand up.
3. Explain to the group that Amelia Earhart was a pilot. 
4. Read out Amelia’s story.

Make the planes

1. Tell everyone that they’re going to be taking part in the Paper Aeroplane Olympics, inspired by Amelia Earhart.
2. Explain to everyone that they need to make a paper aeroplane. It can be big, small, wide, colourful, be simple or complex. It needs to be designed to fly as far as possible and they could think about using different items, such as paper clips, to help make it fly faster.
3. Now, get everyone to make a paper aeroplane.
4. Once everyone’s finished making their plane, ask them to give it a name.

How to make a paper aeroplane  

Name	Characteristics				How to make it
	Size	Speed	Distance	Complexity
Basic Big Dipper	Small	Fast	Long	Simple	The basic
Daring Dart	Small to medium	Fast	Long	Simple to medium	Basic dart
Shooting Star	Small	Slow	Medium	Complex	Stunt Plane
Jumbo Jet	Large	Fast	Medium	Complex	Sonic jet
Galaxy Glider	Large	Slow	Long	Simple	Stealth glider
Soaring Spinner	Small	Slow	Short	Simple	Spinner plane

 

Run the activity

1. Everyone should get into small groups of about 3 to 4 to throw at the same time. If you have a smaller group or smaller space, people could throw one at a time.
2. Tell everyone that there’ll be so many rounds and points to score after each round.
3. Remind everyone that the way they throw the plane can also impact how far it flies. They could throw it upwards, low to the ground or taking your arm further back to throw it.
4. Explain that after their go, they can go back to the craft table and make any adjustments to their plane that they’d like to. They just need to be ready for their next go.
5. Show everyone the throwing space and the markers. Explain that each marker is 1 m apart and, in this game, each metre will count as 10 points, so 2 m is 20 points, 3 m is 30 points and so on. Extra points can be given out for creativity or teamwork, too.
6. Tell everyone that there’ll be 5 rounds and the aim of each round is to try to get their paper aeroplane as far as possible.
7. Call the first group up to the throwing line.
8. Countdown or blow a whistle and let everyone throw their planes.
9. Once they’ve landed, a volunteer or young leader should tell each player their score to write down or to tell another volunteer to write down, depending on how scores are managed.
10. Players should retrieve their aeroplane and the next group steps up to throw, until everyone’s finished the first round.
11. Repeat steps 7 to 10 until there’s been 5 rounds. Remember, people can amend their planes between their throws to experiment. Different designs or weights may help make planes faster.
12. If a plane hits another plane mid-flight, it’s the referee’s decision if they can fly again.
13. If a plane goes outside the throwing area or a player stands over the throwing line, again, it’s up to the referee to decide if points should be deducted or if it’s a foul. But make sure everyone knows the rules before playing.
14. Once finished, count the scores, give out any bonus points for creativity, teamwork or supportive players, then announce the winners. Happy throwing!