Knot a race
You’ll need
- Masking tape
- Rope
- Cones
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 helpers for each team to have one. You may need some parents and carers to help out if you’re short on helpers.
- Mark out a start and a finish line.
- Use markers to create points in between. The number of markers determines how long the game lasts for.
- Make a list of knots and hitches to try out, depending on the level of the group.
Get ready to tie knots
- Give everyone a length of rope.
- Everyone should line up at the start line with their rope, making sure they stay a safe distance from each other.
- The person leading the game should call out the name of a knot or a hitch, and each player should try to tie it.
- The person leading the game check each player’s knot or hitch. Anyone who ties it correctly can step forward to the next marker.
- Repeat until someone crosses the finish line.
Reflection
This activity is all about practising skills, using knots and hitches that the group already knows. If some members are confident with the knots and hitches, they could teach others. Which knots and hitches were easy, and which were difficult? How do you get better at tying knots and hitches? When is it useful to know knots and hitches?
This activity was also about problem-solving, because you had to think on your feet about which knot or hitch you were being asked to tie. You also had to think about what you could do if you didn’t know how to tie it. What did you do when you needed help to tie a knot or hitch? Which was the most useful knot or hitch you tied today? Do you know what any of the knots or hitches are used for?
Safety
All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.
The person leading the activity can change the knots they request to make the game easier or more challenging.
The group can play in pairs, and both step forward if either can complete the knot. This could also be used as a first round, increasing the difficulty in the second round when it becomes single-player.
All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.
