The 53rd Jamboree On The Air will take place on 16 and 17 October 2010.
Vuvuzela Morse Code
From the National JOTA Organizer in (of course) South-Africa comes the suggestion to have a game with Morse Code on the vuvuzela. Dave Gemmell suggests:
- i) choose a place to practice so as not to annoy any one.
- ii) don’t practice after 19H00 or before 08H00 or on Sundays
- iii) wash/clean the mouth piece properly before blowing
- a) send each character correctly in morse.
- b) how many scouts can receive message correctly?
- c) determine the maximum distance that can be achieved.
- d) record the distance and tell us about it.
The 53rd JOTA theme: “The Right to be Heard”
This years JOTA will have a theme directly related to article 12 of the Convention of the Rights of the Child: the Right to be Heard. The theme is linked to the 20th anniversary of the Convention: http://www.unicef.org/rightsite/
How is article 12, the Right to be Heard, linked to the JOTA?
Scouts in many, but not all, countries have the permission to speak directly over amateur radio. This greatly enhances their JOTA experience: a free and direct exchange of ideas between Scouts of all Nations. It helps them to get a feeling and understanding of other cultures. The Right to be Heard is also a Right to be Listened to.
The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) is fully supporting the Scouts to participate in JOTA. And even further, IARU stimulates to educate them in radio techniques so that they may once operate their own station. In fact, the IARU Region 1 Conference 2008 in Cavtat, Croatia passed the following resolution CT08_C3_Rec 24: (Paper CT08_C3_39):
In recognizing the importance of the JOTA (Jamboree-On-the-Air) for radio amateur recruiting, it is recommended that Member Societies encourage radio amateurs to assist boy Scouts and girl Guides to participate in the annual JOTA the third full weekend of October each year, organized by the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM) and to use this opportunity to present amateur radio recruiting possibilities to the Scouts/Guides.
The Right to be Heard….on the air.
Additional programme suggestions
A few examples of the many programme suggestions available in the JOTA fact sheets (on the radio-scouting web or in printed form):
- The continuing story.... Make up a short imaginative story of ten lines. Read it to the station with whom you are in contact. Ask them to add the next part to this story and pass it on to the next scout station that they will contact. If you receive such a story by radio from another scout group, write it down in your station report afterwards. This activity is also very well suited for RTTY (telex) and packet-radio contacts.
- The global weather situation. Take a large wall map of the whole world. Ask the Scouts who you speak to, to give you the local weather report. Indicate this on the map for the area where they are located. A weather report in a local newspaper will show you how to do this on a map. At the end of the weekend you have the global weather view.
- Determine the distance of each radio contact that you make and add them all up. Can you reach 100.000 km in one JOTA weekend ?
- Make a simple drawing. Give instructions by radio to Scouts how to draw the same picture, line by line, without telling them what the picture is. Can they reconstruct your drawing and tell you what it is ?
- Each scout patrol gets 20 metres of ordinary electrical wire. Can they construct a "super antenna", to their imagination, with which the radio operator can make a contact ?
- Find out what the local names are for "Scouts" and "Guides" in at least ten different countries. Make a list.
- Learn to sing the first lines of a foreign song. Find some Scouts on the radio from the country where the song comes from. Sing their song and see if they can join you in it.
Furthermore, the on-line radio-scouting library presents you amongst others:
- Idea book for antennas pulled into the air by kites
- Several exciting Foxhunting recipes
- Radio Puzzle games from different countries
- Morse code games
- Idea set for playing with the world’s time differences
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