School Incursions Melbourne

Urban Quest brings the excitement of an Amazing Race directly to your school grounds. Students are divided into teams of 5-6 and embark on an adventure filled with riddles, challenges, and clues. 

Tasks involve a mix of logical puzzles – decoding riddles to find destinations; navigational challenges – orienteering to specific spots; and engaging activities – solving puzzles, uncovering clues, and interacting with game agents.

These dynamic and hands-on activities are designed to foster communication, resilience and collaboration.

Urban Quest school incursions are designed for all year levels from Prep to Year 12.

Each experience is tailored to the students’ age, event objectives, and the specific layout of the school grounds. Urban Quest’s school incursions emphasise social skills and teamwork while aligning with key curriculum objectives for P-12 year levels.

For primary school students, a paper-based event is available, while secondary school students can enjoy a tech-enhanced experience using smart devices like phones or tablets.

Each activity encourages decision-making, leadership, camaraderie, responsibility, and innovative thinking, providing students with a comprehensive and stimulating learning experience.

The amount of space required depends largely on your group size.

Typically, we aim to utilise as much available outdoor space as possible, ensuring tasks are evenly scattered to prevent teams from following each other. 

We always respect any designated out-of-bounds areas to maintain a safe and organised event. We will also work with you to make sure the Urban Quest event is not disrupting the learning process of other students. 

If your group is too large for the existing school space or chosen location, we can arrange multiple sessions to ensure that all students have the best experience possible. 

Urban Quest school incursions can indeed be set up in parks and reserves, but we generally recommend this option only if a school setup is not available. 

Setting up Urban Quest on your school grounds is usually preferable because we can make extensive use of existing infrastructure for clear directions and visible clues.

Nature reserves without infrastructure may not provide the same level of clarity. Additionally, the segmented layout of most schools creates an ideal environment for Urban Quest school incursions.

For an optimal Urban Quest experience, we primarily utilise outdoor areas. 

However, a couple of challenges may require indoor setups as they involve the use of a TV/projector and a landline phone (receiving the clue over the phone – how cool is that?!). 

We will work with you to determine the most appropriate locations for these indoor tasks, ensuring a seamless integration with the overall event

Urban Quest school incursions are designed for teams of students to be largely self-sufficient, with no direct teacher help or supervision required. 

However, it is up to the school to decide how to manage safety supervision. Teachers can be strategically placed to oversee certain parts of the school, if necessary. We can provide guidance on which specific areas of the school will be used for the Urban Quest setup.

Urban Quest can accommodate groups of virtually any size.

The capacity largely depends on the size of the school grounds and how many students can be accommodated at once without impacting the experience’s logistics and layout. 

Typically, the size of most schools allows to run 100-150 students in one session.

If your group is too large for the existing school space, we can arrange multiple sessions to ensure that all students have the best experience possible. 

We will collaborate with you on planning and provide advice on the best practices to achieve this.

Many schools choose to run Urban Quest for all their year levels in one day over multiple back-to-back sessions.

Yes, year levels can be combined in one session, provided your school size allows us to accommodate larger numbers at once. It’s ideal to combine students of similar ages. 

For instance, Y5s and Y6s work perfectly together, as do Y3s and Y4s. 

Y1s and Y2s can even include Prep/Foundation students. 

For secondary school students, Y7 to Y9 can work well together, as well as Y10s through to Y12s.

The paper-based version of Urban Quest is recommended for primary school students, offering a straightforward and accessible option. Participants receive task sheets with instructions and to fill out with answers using pens or pencils, engaging their problem-solving skills.

In contrast, the tech-based version is strongly recommended for secondary school students. This version utilises students’ personal smartphones, enhancing interactivity and aligning well with the students’ technological familiarity. Teams use their smartphones to receive instructions and submit answers throughout the game. 

While we respect differing mobile phone policies at schools, we recommend allowing students to use their smartphones solely for the duration of the game to optimise the Urban Quest experience.

Booking an on-campus Urban Quest school incursion is straightforward, and we assist you every step of the way. Here’s how it works:

1. Initial Inquiry: Start by visiting this School Incursions webpage to see if Urban Quest aligns with your vision for your students. If it does, you can make an inquiry either by calling us or submitting it online.

2. Phone Chat: We will gather more details about your school grounds, event objectives, student numbers, and preferred dates and times. Based on this information, we will email you a quote, availability, timeframes and any details specific to your setup.

3. School Inspection: Once you confirm your intention to proceed with Urban Quest, we will schedule an inspection. One of our specialists will visit your school to understand the site specifics, walk around, and take a few photos to design an experience that perfectly matches your layout and requirements.

4. Event Day Preparation: After the inspection and planning, you simply need to wait for the event day. Meanwhile, arrange your students in teams of 5-6 and don’t forget to get them excited. We’ll take care of the rest!

On the event day, your Host will arrive 1.5-2 hours earlier to set up. Ensure they can access your school if the event starts with the first bell. Here’s the rundown:

1. Setup and Teacher Briefing:

   – The Host sets up the event around the school site.

   – 15 minutes before the start, involved teachers are briefed on their locations and activities.

2. Student Preparation:

   – 5 minutes before the start, students are arranged in their teams at the designated starting point.

   – A pre-start instructional session follows, typically lasting 15-20 minutes.

3. Game Time:

   – Once everyone is ready, the game begins, lasting for the agreed duration of time, typically around 1 hour or slightly more.

4. Conclusion:

   – After the game, all teams gather at the meeting spot for the scores announcement and award ceremony.

   – Participants will have the opportunity to share their experiences.

   – Everyone will be acknowledged, and there is a prize for the winning team!

The preparation is quite minimal and can be managed at any stage before the event.

The primary responsibility is arranging students into teams of 5-6, which can be done either strategically to enhance communication and collaboration or randomly if the goal is pure fun. 

For tech-based school incursions the only requirement is for every participant to have a fully charged smartphone with mobile data (minor usage required).

At Urban Quest, we understand Melbourne’s unpredictable weather – from sunny spells to sudden showers and back again! We’re committed to ensuring your event runs smoothly regardless of the weather, unless conditions are extreme*.

In the unlikely event of extreme weather, we’ll collaborate with you to reschedule for a suitable date and time. Fortunately, weather cancellations are exceedingly rare; in fact, we’ve had only one or two in many years of operation. We monitor forecasts closely and will keep you informed of any changes.

*Extreme weather includes conditions that pose safety risks to participants, such as heavy rainstorms or severe heatwaves.