Creative Corn Maze Education

I think autumn is my favorite season. I like the change of colors, cooling of the weather, and the local couple farm fall festivals. To give you a little bit of background, I grew up in Nebraska but I never heard of a corn maze until I moved to Idaho (I know right? It is the cornhusker state)

We bought season passes this year so that we can do all activities at any time. We decided this is going to be our sole recreation for the month of October. Now the corn maze is my favorite part and I look forward to it every year. Last year, as I was walking it, I was trying to think how I could use this activity in education and I think I came up with a few ways. So when my kids are old enough, I am going to do the following:

#1. Do the maze – This activity is obvious. I think mazes are great brain builders. They can do this activity with the small map they receive or without.

#2. Blindfolded – When they are teenagers, I am going to blindfold them and walk or carry them into the maze. They can try to use their special spy skills to count and remember turns if they are smart enough to think about it. I will put them somewhere in the maze, take off the blindfold, give them a map, and they have to figure out where they are and make it to the exit.

#3. High Tech – This one involves the use of a GPS but will require more work. I will go through the maze and perhaps leave things at certain locations. They have to find these locations and mark them on the map. I still have to test this one to see if the Garmin will work in tall corn. I imagine if the satellites are directly above I will be fine.

#4. Super difficult – When they are 16 or above, they will have a competition with themselves. They will get a blank piece of paper and their task is to map out the maze themselves. Whoever comes within having at least 60% or more of the maze correct wins. This one is difficult and time consuming (yay!). This one will be optional. I will probably attach a substantial reward for motivation.

But alas, my kids aren’t old enough for this. But if yours are and you have a corn maze near you, I’d love to hear what you might do. For now though, I will have to settle for petting zoos, pig races, spider-webs, fake jails and all the other kiddo attractions at the Farmstead.