7 original ideas for your DofE expedition aim
Your DofE group need to come up with an expedition aim but you’re stuck for ideas. Maybe you’re looking for something fun and fascinating that won’t make the expedition more difficult? In this article I’ll go through 7 original ideas for your group’s expedition aim that find the perfect combination of enjoyable, interesting and easy.
You are required to have an aim for your expedition, planned in advance, as stated in the 20 conditions of a DofE expedition. This aim can be focused on anything from improving teamwork, to studying the nature you see, to measuring the physical effects of hiking.
1. Study the mood of the team throughout the expedition
This is definitely my favourite aim on the list (in fact, I wish I’d thought of it a few years ago!). It’s so practical because very minimal effort is required whilst on the expedition, while afterwards you can produce some genuinely interesting and insightful data, which could be further analysed in a presentation.
To study the varying mood of the team throughout the expedition, you could ask each teammate to rate their mood out of 10 at each checkpoint of the day. All you have to do is record the data on a paper pad (or electronic device if you’re allowed). Then, after the expedition, convert the data into some fancy looking graphs to make for a great presentation!
I decided to come up with some fake data for a hypothetical 3-day Silver expedition (this would work for Bronze and Gold too), and then made a few graphs to show how you could present the information you collect.
You could record the data on a paper pad and then create an Excel spreadsheet like this one after the expedition.
Average mood at each checkpoint:
Average mood of each person:
2. Observe and record the star constellations
If your team would enjoy looking up at the night sky and spending a little time identifying different star constellations, planets or even the occasional shooting star then this is a great aim that you can all do as a group.
You can ask your assessor in advance if you can use your phone to help, but even if you are I think it’s more in the spirit of DofE to print out a few pieces of paper in advance that tell you where to look and how to recognise the planets and constellations. Coupled with the compasses you’ll have for navigation in the daytime, you’ll be good to go!
I would recommend using the website timeanddate.com for help finding the planets of our solar system. You can input a location (doesn’t need to be specific - ‘Lake District’ for example would be good enough) and a date, and it will tell you which planets are visible at what times, as well as their compass bearing and angle above the horizon.
For constellations, you can read this great article by Eureka! on 5 constellations everyone can find. Designate each member of the group a specific constellation to write down/learn how to locate, and then see how many you can find on the expedition.
If you have to do a presentation, your group can discuss which planets and constellations the group found more easily, and which ones you weren’t able to locate. Was there an issue with the weather, such as cloudy skies? Or potentially the effects of pollution?
3. Investigate the maintenance of footpaths
This aim is perfect if you’d prefer something with an angle on conservation and maintenance of the environment. There are a number of ways you could go about it practically, from taking photos of footpaths of varying levels of maintenance, to devising a system to grade their maintenance quantitatively.
I think if it were my group I’d suggest doing a combination of both. You can’t record information on every footpath you walk on - that would be too much. But you can record information on the footpath you happen to be walking on at say, 10am, 12pm and 2pm each day. In addition to this, you could take photos of any footpaths that stand out as extremely well maintained or extremely poorly maintained.
This way, you’ll produce some numerical data that can be displayed graphically in a presentation, as well as having photos that evidence the range of footpaths you came across. I’ve made up some data to show how you could display the varying levels of maintenance of footpaths in a pie chart, seen below.
4. Use your expedition experience to write a piece of literature
You can use your experiences on the expedition to create a series of poems, or write a short story. There are no specific rules on what kind of literature this would have to be, so you have a lot of freedom and room for creativity — just make sure it’s something all members of the group can contribute to.
You could use a specific event on your expedition to create a semi-fictional story. You could give each member of the group a different photo from the expedition and ask them to write about how they felt in that moment, and to describe the scenery. You could write a series of poems, some funny, some serious, some awe-inspiring. You could write a news article describing your multi-day hike and why others may want to take the same route.
While some suggestions may feel a bit cringeworthy, the huge freedom you have to be creative should allow most groups to find a type of literature that works for them.
5. Collect a variety of leaves from a variety of trees and bushes
An easy and interesting way to engage with the nature you walk through would be by collecting a leaf from many different varieties of trees and bushes throughout your expedition. You could then press the leaves once back home, and even try to identify which species of tree/bush it comes from.
Practically, this is quite an easy aim to execute. Each person in the group brings an extra resealable plastic bag, and when someone spots a new type of leaf, pick one, put it in a bag to keep it waterproof, and keep walking.
After the expedition each person should press the leaves they collected. You can do this by flattening them out and putting them under a heavy stack of books for a day or two. If you want to press your leaves really professionally then check out this great article by The Spruce.
Finally, try to identify the leaves that you collected. An brilliant website for leaf identification is leaf-id.com, which asks you a series of questions and then suggests a number of species (with photos) that it may be.
6. Keep a log of the weather and how the group responded
It’s likely the weather will vary a fair amount over the course of your expedition. You’ll be cold, you’ll be hot, it will rain, the sun will shine. It would be interesting to keep a record of how the weather changes over the course of your expedition and how you responded to it as a group.
Practically, you could execute this aim by recording the weather at set times of the day - for example breakfast, lunch and dinner - and making a note of any other significant changes in weather, for example if it starts to rain.
For each change in weather record how the group responded. When it was cold in the morning did you layer up or did you choose to stay cold in the knowledge that you’ll heat up quickly once you get hiking? When it started raining, did you put on your waterproofs immediately, or did you find shelter and wait to see if it passed? When it was scorching hot, how did you make sure you were drinking enough water?
You can collate all this information and display the information graphically if you’re doing a presentation, such as the pie graph below, which shows how people responded to cold weather in the morning.
7. Effectively designate and share group tasks
There will be a number of group tasks throughout your expedition. From pitching the tent to cleaning up the stove to map and compass navigation, you’ll have to share tasks fairly and effectively.
This group aim doesn’t lend itself so much to numerical measurements, but rather a qualitative discussion of how tasks are distributed to ensure everyone does their fair share. Were tasks designated based on personal preference? Or was it more to do with capability, for example the best map readers did more navigating and less cleaning up?
Importantly, you should also discuss what you got wrong and could improve at next time round. For example, did one person end up doing more of the group tasks than expected?