Feature Finder

Before you begin 

• Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Take a look at our 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

Planning and setting up this activity 

• The person leading the activity should print out the ‘Map and Features’ sheet for each participant.
• This sheet is designed for A4 paper, but could be enlarged to A3 using a photocopier to give more room to work with.

 Play mappleships

1. The person leading the activity should give each person a ‘Map and features’ sheet.
2. Everyone should quietly draw one of each map feature onto their grid.
3. They should pay attention to how many squares each feature should take up. For this activity, they only need to draw the lake, which should take up two squares. They can skip the others for now.
4. Everyone should keep their maps secret from each other.
5. Split the group into pairs. This will be a game of strategy and navigation!
6. The first player in each pair should guess a grid square on their partner’s map.
7. Their partner will reply with information about whether a landmark (like the lake) is in that square, and whether the entire feature has been found yet.
   • For example: “You’ve found part of my lake, but there’s one more square to find.”
8. Players should keep track of their guesses using a second sheet or another coloured pen. They could also cut out map symbols and place them on a reference sheet to help them remember.
9. Players take turns guessing until someone has located all of their opponent’s landmarks.

Track the Flight Path

1. Once the game has finished, the person leading the activity should bring the group together for a short discussion.
2. Show everyone a combination of Ordnance Survey (OS) maps and satellite images — ideally of the same area.
3. Just like hikers and drivers, pilots use landmarks to help them navigate, especially when flying at lower altitudes under Visual Flight Rules (VFR).
4. Ask everyone to look at the OS map and identify useful landmarks for:
   1. Hikers (e.g. rivers, forests, ridgelines, footpaths)
   2. Drivers (e.g. roads, towns, petrol stations, shopfronts)
   3. Pilots (e.g. main roads, lakes, river, towers, wind turbines)
5. Explain that maps for pilots are called aeronautical charts. These are highly detailed and include:
   1. Terrain and elevation
   2. Obstacles like towers, pylons, and wind farms
   3. Navigation routes and airspace zones
   4. Airports and restricted zones
   5. Mention that pilots must know which country’s airspace they’re flying through, and get permission if needed.
6. Ask the group to compare the OS map to the satellite image.
   
   1. How clearly can they identify real-world features?
   2. Are some features easier or harder to spot from above?
7. Encourage everyone to visualise flying over the area using the map. Ask questions such as:
   1. What would they see from above?
   2. What landmarks would help them track where they are?
   3. What could be confusing or easy to mistake (e.g. two similar lakes or roads)?
8. Explain that even in modern aviation, pilots still use major roads (like the M25) and other visible features to stay oriented. Terrain is especially important for low-altitude or glider flights.

Draw and Follow a Flight Path

1. Give each pair or small group an OS map of the area. Ask one person to draw a simple “flight route” across the map using a coloured pen. This should follow visible features like rivers, roads, or woodland edges — just like a pilot might do.
2. The person drawing should then give verbal flight instructions to another person in the group (without showing them the route), using landmarks to describe the path. For example:
   “Take off near the large forest. Follow the river north until you reach the town. Then turn right and fly toward the wind turbines.”
3. The other person should listen carefully and try to trace the same route on a satellite image of the same area, using the verbal instructions and visible landmarks.
4. Once done, compare the drawn route on the OS map with the route traced on the satellite image.
5. Finish the activity by discussing what made the navigation easy or difficult. Emphasise how pilots must give and receive clear, concise instructions — often using known landmarks — especially when visual navigation is involved.