Get airport security smart

Før du begynner (Before you begin)

• Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. There's also more guidance to help you carry out your risk assessment, including examples. 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. 

Planlegg denne aktiviteten (Planning this activity) 

• This activity would benefit from having someone who’s been through airport security before supporting it. If no-one in the group has been through airport security before, you could invite someone to visit the group and perhaps talk a bit about their experience travelling internationally before or after this activity. 
• In a session before this activity, ask those taking part to design their own passport. 

Gjør klar denne aktiviteten (Setting up this activity)

• You'll need something to represent a passport and a boarding pass. You’ll need one per person or one per group. This could simply be a piece of paper or you could have the young people make their own as a separate activity ahead of time.
• Write out or print out a list of safety instructions for the security area and leave them on the desk, along with some ziplock, clear, plastic bags. The instructions are: 
  • All electronic devices should be clearly visible and in their own tray. 
  • All liquids (under 100ml) should be placed in a clear plastic bag and clearly visible. 
  • Any coats should be taken off and put in separate trays. 
  • Note – these are example security rules based on 2023 airport requirements, make sure to check the most up-to-date rules.  

• Set up a hoop or coned area for each team. This will be their ‘home’. Place any items, or resource sheet slips of paper, here. You can also place the passports, the ‘suitcase’ and the ‘backpack’.  
• Turn the meeting place into an airport. You’ll need two areas, one being check in and the other being security. 
• The check in desk should be a table that’s set up so that someone can stand behind the desk and a suitcase (or the container representing the suitcase) can be placed next to the desk. 
• The security line should consist of: 
  • a ‘bin area’, which can be a bucket, empty table or empty container for groups to leave things they can’t or don’t want to take through security. 
  • an ‘Xray area’, which can be a table with kitchen trays on where groups prepare what they have in their hand luggage to go through the xray machine. 
  • a ‘metal detector’, which is something for groups to travel through. A doorway or arch would be ideal, though groups could pass through cones, under a table or through a play tunnel. 
  • an ‘inspection area’, which can be a separate table for guards looking through any suspicious trays. 
  • a ‘collection area; for groups to repack their hand luggage after it’s been through the Xray machine. 

 La oss leke (Let’s Play)  

1. Gather everyone together and explain that you’re going to play a game where you pretend to go through the airport.  
2. Divide everyone into teams.  
3. Tell everyone which country they’re travelling to. It could be Norway for the Roverway, or it could be another country, such as France, Spain, Italy, Austria, Australia or Iceland.  
4. Teams should pack their bags. They’ll get a point for every person and every item they successfully pack and get aboard the plane, which could be recorded by a stamp, sticker or tick on their boarding pass to help you track scores. 
5. At the end, everyone can find out which teams got the most points. 

Pakk til turen (Pack for your trip)

1. Each group should decide which items they’re going to take in their ‘hold luggage’, which will be checked in and in this scenario is their suitcase. They should also decide which items they want to put in their ‘hand luggage’ which will come on the plane with them and in this scenario be a backpack. 
2. Give each group a set of items they might want to take on holiday (or the cut-up kit list to represent the items) 
3. Each group should place the items into either their ‘hand luggage’ (backpack) or their ‘hold luggage’ (suitcase). 
4. They should think carefully about what might be allowed aboard the plane and any weight restrictions.  
5. Remind everyone that they can leave items behind. 
6. You might want to send an adult volunteer round who asks people to pack something on their behalf. Groups should refuse, but they might be caught out. Remember to ask them at the check in desk. 
7. When they’re ready, groups can line up at check in and wait for it to open. You could open check in when people may still be packing, so you could put a time limit on check in to make it harder. 

 Passkontroll (Passport check)

1. When ‘check in’ is open, an adult volunteer and young leader should stand behind the check-in desk and call for the first group to come forward.  
2. The group should be asked for the passport. The groups will get a point for every passport to the person standing behind the check in desk. If they’ve left them at home, they’ll have to go back to collect them, then re-join the queue. You could deduct points for each passport forgotten. 
3. The person standing behind the check in desk should check that the passport is for the person standing in front of them. This is so that the airline can confirm you’re the person the ticket is booked for. You might want to ask some questions about who packed the suitcase and if they packed anything on people’s behalf. If they answer yes, you might deduct a point. Remind everyone to never carry anything on to an aircraft for anyone else, as you might not know what it really is and it might not be what they say it is, so you could be helping them to commit a crime.  
4. Once the passport has been checked, each group should get a point on one their boarding pass. You could also add a bonus point if people put their passports in their hand luggage, rather than their hold luggage (suitcase).  
5. The person behind the check in desk should then hand the passports back to the group, along with their boarding passes, and they can move to security. Remember to keep your boarding passes and passports safe! 

Vei baggasjen (Luggage weighing)

1. The group should place their suitcase next to the check in desk. In an airport, this is a set of weighing scales to check the bag isn’t over the weight limit.  
2. You may want to ask teams to make sure their suitcase is under a certain weight before they can travel to make it harder. 
3. If you’re using actual items in the suitcase, you may want to use a weighing scale and weigh the suitcase. 
4. If you’re using paper slips with items written on them, you could note down the weight of all the items, open the group’s case and add up the weights to see if they’re under the weight limit.  
5. You could also check the suitcase items and remove any items that wouldn’t be allowed in the hold of the plane. You could use the restrictions from your local airport or from Heathrow Airport. Remove any items that they can’t travel with.  
6. Give teams a point for every successful item packed in their hold luggage on their boarding passes. You could deduct points for any items that were removed. 
7. When the suitcase is checked in, groups should move to the security line. 

Forbered deg på sikkerhetskontrollen (Preparing to go through security)

1. When they’ve been through check in, groups should move to the security line. An adult volunteer or young leader should be running the security desk.  
2. At the ‘bin area’, the group should place any items they would bin before going through security. For example, packed lunch wrappers or items not allowed according to the security rules. 
3. At the ‘x-ray area’, groups should split up their hand luggage into separate trays and follow the rules outline in the 'airport security rules'. 

Sikkerhetskontrollen (Security checks)

1. The person ‘working at security’ should move the trays through the x-ray area to the collection area. 
2. While moving the trays, the security worker should look at the contents of the tray – if anything doesn’t meet the ‘security rules’, take that tray to the ‘inspection area’. 
3. If a tray’s taken to the ‘inspection area’, the group must go to the area and watch while the security worker goes through the tray and takes out the items that don’t meet the rules. 
4. Give teams a point for every item packed in their hand luggage that’s successfully made it through security on their boarding passes. 
5. You could introduce a random inspection and the security worker may choose a tray at random to take to the inspection area. You could give out surprise points, such as an extra 2 points for packing a pen as it can be useful to have. 
6. You may want to deduct points for any items that were in the hand luggage that weren’t packed correctly, such as liquids not in a plastic bag or coats not on separate trays. You could deduct points for any item that had to be removed as it wasn’t allowed in hand luggage. 

Gå gjennom sikkerhetskontrollen (Getting ready to go through security)

1. Groups should move to the security line. An adult volunteer or young leader should be running the metal detector.  
2. Each member should walk through the ‘metal detector’ one at a time. However, people must wait until they’re called by someone monitoring the detector. You could deduct 1 point if anyone goes through without being asked.
3. The person monitoring the metal detector may choose someone to ‘beep’ at, meaning the metal detector went off. 
4. The person who went through the metal detector when it ‘went off’ should step to one side and follow the instructions of the person monitoring the metal detector. For example, the instruction could be an easy task for the whole group to do, such as standing on one leg for 30 seconds or answering an easy question. If they don’t complete the task or get the answer wrong, they could be deducted a point for setting the metal detector off. 
5. Once every member of the group has made it through the metal detector, they should collect their items from the ‘collection area’ and sit down on the plane. 

Fly og landing (Flying and landing) 

1. Everyone should sit down on the plane.  
2. Remind the groups which country they were flying to. 
3. Pick five items that would be most important when travelling to this country. For example, if it’s a hot country, it may be sun cream, a hat, sunglasses, refillable water bottle and shorts.  
4. Give any teams with these items an extra point.  
5. Now check everyone has their passport and boarding pass. Anyone who has there’s and can produce it within 30 seconds of the spot check can get an extra point. 

Hvem kom seg gjennom flyplassen? (Who successfully made it through the airport?) 

1. Gather everyone together and ask everyone to add up their points. 
2. You could give out bonus points for good teamwork, excellent planning, patience or communication. 
3. Ask everyone what items they chose to put in their suitcase. Were any of the items marked as ‘hand luggage only’ on the resource sheet? Does the list of ‘hand luggage only’ items surprise anyone? 
4. Ask everyone what items they chose to put in their hand luggage. Were any of the items marked as ‘hold luggage only’ on the resource sheet? Does the list of ‘hold luggage only’ items surprise anyone? 
5. How did groups find going through security? Does anyone who’s been through airport security want to say anything about the differences between this activity and the reality of going through airport security?