The DofE expedition resources below are made available to help deliver DofE expedition training, both in the classroom and outside.
At the top of the page you will find DofE Expedition Training Resources produced by Lupine Adventure Co-operative. Our 4 most popular downloads are highlighted below.
Further down the page there are DofE Expedition Resources donated by others, and Ordnance Survey Resources reproduced with permission.
Click a title to jump to the individual resource details and relevant download links.
This download is the 36 page DofE Expedition Course Notes document that we provide to participants that we train. These are used to complement the lessons that we deliver for The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award expedition section. They cover:
Last updated: September 2023
This 24 page work book goes with the Course Notes document. We’ve taken the few work book pages out of the course notes and expanded on them massively. We only use this document in its entirety with Gold groups (though some pages we use at all levels).
We have 3 versions of this document.
The first one uses OS maps in many examples. If you have good print facilities then this is probably the best one to use as it is the type of map that groups tend to use.
The second version uses Open Source mapping, it is a bit clearer (as it is less detailed). You may wish to use this version if you are printing in black and white or if your printer has trouble with OS maps level of definition.
The third version is the OS maps version but with many of the fields editable so participants can fill it in on a device and email the document to you if you wish to review or mark their answers.
If you would like a copy with the answers completed then please contact us.
Expedition Work Book – OS Mapping Version
Expedition Work Book – Open Source Mapping Version
Expedition Work Book – Editable Version
Last updated: August 2023
These are PowerPoints and lesson plans for some areas of the DofE expedition syllabus.
Sessions 0-6 we often teach in classrooms so there are accompanying lesson plans. Sessions 7-10 we have only ever delivered in a lecture theatre setting (and then only once) as we usually do these outside on training walks.
Most aspects of the lessons can be performed over remote teaching applications.
We don’t consider these ‘ready to go’ as we usually edit them a little to tailor them to the audience.
The lessons 1-6 are designed for participants to have copies of our Course Notes and the Workbook to fill in (there is an editable PDF version of the workbook if this is to be done on a computer rather than printed out).
Alternatively, if you are working remotely you can use the Google Forms links to copy some quizzes to your Google Drive. You can then share these forms from your Google drives with participants for them to fill in at the right points. You will have to edit the PowerPoint files accordingly if you wish to use the forms quizzes.
Download all PowerPoints and Lesson Plans (205MB)
Individual files are available to download below.
0 : Introduction to DofE Expeditions
PowerPoint
1 : Introduction to OS Maps
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
Quiz 1 Quiz 2
2 : Navigating with OS Maps
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
Quiz
3 : Hazards
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
Quiz
4 : Kit
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
Quiz
5 : Menu Planning
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
Quiz (Not self-marking)
6 : Route Planning (eDofE)
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
6 : Route Planning (Paper Maps)
PowerPoint
Lesson Plan
7 : Emergency Procedures & First Aid
PowerPoint
8 : Camping on a Campsite
PowerPoint
9 : The Countryside Code
PowerPoint
10: The Team Goal and Presentation
PowerPoint
Last updated: September 2023
When teaching our Introduction to OS maps over Microsoft Teams during the 2021 lockdown I found it very difficult to explain how to measure distance from the map so I knocked up this quick one minute long video in a break.
You can watch the video on YouTube or download the .mp4 to your computer. to put into the PowerPoint presentation if you wish.
Video in mp4 Format (Right click and ‘Save link as’)
Copies of cards designed to provoke discussion within a group as to a prudent order of doing things when faced with an emergency. We use these cards when teaching emergency procedures to Duke of Edinburgh’s Award (DofE) participants. Each card contains an activity (apply first aid or move the casualty into a tent for example), the participants have to place the cards into a sensible order that they would carry out the activity.
It works very well, most groups end up with a line of main activities and columns coming off the row indicating things they would do at the same time. Student and instructor briefing cards are on the last page. I am beginning to think that there are a few too many cards so you may wish to consider taking some out of the set. If you find these useful and would like copies printed onto card then let us know and we’ll run some off for you.
We print something similar to these out onto A5, laminate them and give them to participants that we are supervising. I have removed references to Lupine from them but you will still want to edit them to fit your organisations requirements. They are here as a guide to what you could produce. We have two versions. One version is issued when we have issued a spot tracker device. The other version is if they haven’t been issued with a spot tracking device.
These cards have been developed to help teach the menu planning segment of the DofE Expedition syllabus. There are over 70 cards with different common food types taken on expeditions. Students can use the cards to compare the benefits of different foods and lay them out to make a menu for the day.
The cards are individually numbered so if you print off more than one set you can split them up again if mixed up. The numbers are also colour coded between ‘Breakfast Only’, ‘Breakfast / Lunch / Snack’ and ‘Evening Meal’ so you can concentrate on one meal if you wish. There are blank cards at the end if you wish to add your own.
If you have any requests or suggestions of foods that we could add then just let us know and we’ll stick them on.
Make a Menu – Food Flash Cards
Version 2.4.
This is an identical set of cards to the ones above but they have been enlarged to A5 size. We adapted these cards due to receiving numerous requests to do so from people who use the smaller version in the classroom. These cards are designed to be used by teachers and students to clearly show a room of people the foods that they have chosen.
This is a 24 page A5 booklet on the topic of Remote Supervision and Searching Strategies for if you lose a group. We wrote this for partly for our training courses for teachers and partly for our in house staff training. The table of contents of this booklet reads…
1. Remote Supervision
1.1. What is remote supervision
1.2. Prerequisites of remote supervision
1.3. Contact with the group – Seen vs unseen
1.4. When to stay close
1.5. Techniques of supervision
1.6. Top tips for remote supervision
1.7. Kit in the supervisors bag
1.8. Debriefing the group
1.9. Using electronic trackers
2. Searches
2.1. Primary Searching Strategies
2.2. The Secondary Search
2.3. Calling Mountain Rescue
2.4. Advice to lost / injured groups
Remote Supervision and Searches Booklet
Last updated: February 2020
We always tell our participants that if they are calling for assistance and end up leaving an answer phone message that they also send a text with the same information afterwards. The reasons for this are:
1) We may pass through an area of phone signal or get a fleeting, weak signal meaning that we will see we have a message but be unable to listen to it. If it comes in as a text we can read the message even if we don’t have signal when we come to read it.
2) A text message will transmit exactly how you send it. An answer phone message may be distorted due to poor signal or high wind at the callers location. The caller cannot tell what the recipient will hear.
This is an MP3 of an answer phone message left by a team requesting urgent medical attention and demonstrates the problems leaving messages on an answer phone. As it happened one of our members of staff was about 20 meters away behind a wall as this call was being made (though he couldn’t see or hear what was going on) and was on the scene about 2 minutes later to cries of ‘You’re like ninjas you lot’.
When training groups are in emergency procedures we play this clip to them to illustrate the point.
This 10 minute video shows how to plot a route in eDofE when you don’t have access to a paper map. Covid-19 has meant that a lot of participants are plotting routes at home where they don’t have a copy of the relevant map. This will still be useful post COVID as it is a valid method of route planning (i.e. not planning on a paper map first, before transferring to eDofE for route card creation and sharing). This method involves drawing a straight line between the day’s start and end point before snaking the route around the various paths and rights of way.
You need the Grid References of your start and end points for the day (inculding the two letter prefix) and access to e-DofE
The video is split into 5 chapters, look at the description to jump to the bit you want.
The detail on filling in the route card is a bit too brief in some areas so some knowledge of this beforehand might help. I’ll probably re-make it when eDofE changes substantially and will fix this oversight at that point.
These are the lesson plans for the classroom based instruction that we provide when doing short regular lessons at local schools. They have been superseded somewhat by the PowerPoints above but there are extra ones here as we sometimes have to cover more in the classroom than we would like.
This document contains 12 classroom based session plans covering:
Route card in editable Excel format. Key in the start time and the distance, height gained and rest times on each leg and it will calculate and fill in the estimated time taken and the totals.
Please let us know if you have any suggestions for improvements to this route card.
This excel file has protected cells that the user cannot edit without keying in a password to prevent accidental deletion of formulas. If you would like to know the password so you can edit it further then please ask.
Credit is due to Thomas Gaffney who has made it easier to add more rows and made the formula for the time allowed for height gained much more elegant. And Andrew Preston who has made it look much nicer buy hiding all the zero’s of unused rows.
Version 3.5 – Last updated March 2023
Same route card as above but in PDF format (not editable).
This is the same route card as above in ‘Google sheet’ format. I am not a Google Guru but here goes. You will need to have a Google accout to really use this to its full potential. You can make a copy of this sheet which will save it to your Google Drive. Then give the participants access to it by sharing a link with them. They can then update the sheet on any suitable device attached to the internet. By doing it this way you can keep track of how they are getting on.
Before printing or exporting to PDF you may want to delete any unused rows or simply shrink them a bit to make it fit on one page.
We designed these for our adult courses and winter skills courses (there is a bit of avalanche related things) but also use the timings cards for our DofE groups. They have been elsewhere on the website for years but I thought they should probably be here too.
It is an 8 page A4 PDF with different designs of cards on each page. You can choose the back and front that you want and print off double sided then laminate. The slope angle references are due to most avalanches occurring on slopes between 30 and 45 degrees so won’t be much use. However, it is worth knowing that a slope of 30 degrees may not sound like much but would be too steep for a DofE group to ascend (unless it was on a very wiggly path).
Because as AAP’s we don’t get to see if an assessor has successfully completed their reports on eDofE we ask that they instead complete this Word document. We then take the information from this document and put it into eDofE ourselves. This means that if eDofE fails to record the report either thorough a glitch in its system or through user error we still have a copy of the report.
This DofE expedition training resource is a single sheet of A4 designed to be printed double-sided and laminated. We created it at the request of a teacher who wanted to give her students a sheet that they could keep in their map case as a reminder of these important skills and concepts. If you have any ideas for useful resources that you would like us to try and create then please do get in touch.
This is a single side of A4 with a bit of advice on how to coach efficient up hill walking. Some groups really struggle with the up hill bits. This sheet gives a bit on instruction on how to develop an Alpine Plod within your group.
These are small cards to give to participants to leave at pre-arranged points to let you know that they have gone through. The idea being that if you find a card and then subsequently lose a group you can be pretty sure they are further along their route than the location you found the card.
At Lupine Adventure Co-op we very rarely use these cards (only once or twice in the last 5 years). We have only handed them out on specific days when we have identified a point that we want to check them through but are not sure if we will make in time.
We feel that while they are a useful tool they should be used with caution to prevent creeping towards a ‘lazy’, roadside style of supervision. Additionally it must be remembered that if you don’t see a card you have to be prepared for the fact that it may have been lost, forgotten or removed.
If you use these cards or something similar then it is very important that you always collect them afterwards, if you don’t then you are simply littering the country side (by proxy 🙂 ). In some areas (The New Forest, for example) their use is forbidden due supervisors neglecting to collect them too often in the past. In the New Forest, assessors are asked to remove them irrespective of whether they are current or not. You are advised to check with the local expedition area before using them.
In the past when I haven’t had a card to hand I have given the group an apple and asked them to leave the core on a specific gate post as they pass through (this relies on you having a stash of apples and knowing the route 🙂 .
Our two page, black and white print out, detailing our DofE services for schools.
If you have resources to share then please send them in and we’ll include them. Please make sure they do not include copyrighted images as we won’t be able to check all pictures.
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