Driftwood derby

You’ll need

Access to water suitable for swimming

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.
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.

Practice gliding

Ask everyone to start at the side, in the water, with a solid surface like a wall behind them.
Explain to everyone that they will be practising how to glide through the water.
Show everyone how their arms should look in the water by raising your arms above your head into a triangle, with your palms toughing into a point.
Ask everyone to practise this shape.
When everyone is ready, they should start by holding onto the side and bring their feet up, so they are flat against the wall with knees bent.
Next, take a deep breath and place their face in the water.
Finally, stretch their arms like they practised. At the same time, everyone should push off with their feet and keep their legs straight without kicking.
Hold that gliding position in the water for as long as possible.
When they have gone as far as they can, ask them to swim back to the end of the pool.

The driftwood derby

Everyone should start at the side, in the water, and put their feet on the side in preparation to glide.
When the signal is given, everyone should kick off from the side and try to glide for as long as possible. Imagine you are a piece of driftwood floating down a river.
When the glide stops, everyone should stand up or tread water on the spot where they ended up.
The player that has glided the furthest is the winner.
Everyone can repeat the challenge on their backs and see if they can glide further.

Reflection

This game was about being physically active and learning the skill of gliding. What shape did you have to make to be able to glide a long way? Can you think of natural things other than driftwood that can glide a long way? Why might it be useful to learn how to glide?

This game was also about perseverance. If you weren't able to glide very far the first time, how did you change your tactics to go further? Why do you think it is important to persevere and not give up if a challenge is difficult?

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.

You must run your activities in line with the Safeguarding Code of Conduct for Adults (Yellow Card) and report any concerns to the UK HQ Safeguarding Team.

Water games and activities: Be careful when doing activities with, in, or near water. Check surfaces and reduce the risk of slipping where possible. Make sure you have appropriate supervision for this activity.

Leave plenty of space between swimmers so that they do not collide whilst gliding.

You must always:

Complete a risk assessment
Have the right ratios of number of adults to provide suitable supervision
Set up an InTouch process
Know what to do in an emergency
Share information with parents and carers with an activity information form
Get approval from your Lead Volunteer.

Be safe in water:

Everyone should be able to swim 50 m wearing the clothing or equipment for the activity. Non-swimmers will need additional support.

Water can be dangerous - be aware of the risks.

The category of water depends on how safe the water is. Use our waterways directory to check.

Be sure to manage the group when near water, keeping everyone safe.