Visiting Land Tours

OVERVIEW

In this activity, participants collaboratively create and lead visiting land tours.

There is an opportunity to lead a lesson on facilitation here. Prepare a presentation on best practices in facilitating a walking tour.

OBJECTIVES

• To learn more about a specific place and land

• To facilitate a lesson for the group or for people they will invite

STEP-BY-STEP FACILITATION GUIDE

Participants will work in groups of 3 or 4 to create a tour of a specific place or land. This should be a place that they feel like they all are familiar with or have a relationship to.

The goal is to guide a “visit” to the chosen place. Therefore, the place should be close to where the group meets and accessible to all participants. Encourage them to consider if everyone will be able to move through the place comfortably. Ideally this will be an in-person visit to spend time learning about a place while being there. Participants are encouraged to adapt their visiting tours to best accommodate differing mobility needs.

The guided tour will take a couple weeks to prepare.

Once groups have picked where they will lead their visiting land tours, they will work together to research the site and design a 15-20 minute visiting tour. The tour should involve movement, and have 3 or 4 stops along the way where group members share stories or provide information about the land. The groups can design an activity for participants to do before, during, or after the tour, e.g., a photo challenge, a scavenger hunt, etc.

During the visiting land tour, the other participants are invited to ask questions and comment on what they notice. Having rotating groups conduct tours throughout the program helps to engage participants as facilitators.

If a visiting land tour proves difficult to do in-person, this activity can be adapted as a virtual visit. Participants can use photographs, recordings, and other audio-visual elements to mimic that experience of visiting the place.