Date: (See ‘Available NAW Dates’, found under Pages)
Time: 8 am – 11 am / 3 pm – 6 pm
Venue: Dairy Farm Nature Park, 100 Dairy Farm Road
Fee: Free of charge
Target audience: Children between 9-12 years old

Some of our activities include:

• A guided walk of Wallace Trail, where many fruit trees and interesting plants can be sighted
• Charades, where participants will learn about animals and their unique behaviours
• Dog and Bone, where the participants will learn about the diversity of nature and also about conservation through a fast-paced game
• Flower Identification, done through a game where participants will learn how to identify different kinds of flowers by their characteristics
• Nature scavenger hunt, where participants can appreciate the wonders of nature that can be found in Dairy Farm Nature Park, as well as express their creativity
• Personalised Souvenir-making, where participants are given their own cup to design, plant seeds in it, and watch their very own plant grow over time

To join in the fun, email nature.trailblazers@gmail.com, or call 81801601/91551644. We will be more than happy to answer any enquiries and provide more information about our Nature Adventure Walk. Please indicate your interest at least 10 days before your chosen date.

We hope to receive your support for our programme, and we look forward to your enthusiastic participation!

The Trailblazers

The participants managed to gain much knowledge of Nature and the history of Dairy Farm, while having tons of fun at the same time in the natural environment. This is because Get Wild! Camp is partly based on its predecessor, the highly successful Nature Adventure Walk. This camp includes the best activities from the Nature Adventure Walk, and other new activities were added as well. Through these games and activities, the participants gained knowledge on nature such as pollination, plant types, animals and their characteristics, predator-prey relationships, and much more. The camp provided an informative and exciting way for children to learn more about the natural environment.

One particular activity was the Treasure Hunt, held at the end of the camp, which was a popular hit with the participating children. Slips of paper containing answers were placed in tetra paks and hidden in various corners of Dairy Farm Nature Park. They also had clues which led the children to other tetra paks in the area. The children had a very exciting time exploring the nature park and searching for the hidden tetra paks. At the end of the Treasure Hunt, there was a Speed Question Quiz, which tested the participants on the concepts and knowledge they learned during the camp itself. The participants were extremely eager in answering the questions, and shouts of ‘Eureka!’, the word used when they know the answer, could be heard all over the Wallace Education Learning Lab.

The camp garnered very positive response, which meant a lot to our team as we encountered some difficulties along the way, and it was a whole new experience for us. The participants described the camp’s activites as ‘fun’, and said that they would be most willing to come for the next Get Wild! Camp. The parents, too, called our camp ‘a good effort’. Our mentor for the Young ChangeMakers grant also commented positively on the camp.

Get Wild! Camp was an excellent opportunity for the Trailblazers to gain experience in organizing larger-scale nature camps. It was also the first time we collaborated with another group for a project, and the first time we opened up our nature activities to the public. This camp was indeed a great milestone for our team!

The Trailblazers are truly glad to be able to serve the community once again, this time on a larger scale. We hope that the children of Singapore can learn about the natural environment in an interactive and engaging manner. Hence, we will continually strive to improve our nature activities and outreach, and draw children even closer to nature!

Another exciting Get Wild! Camp will be coming up soon. For further details, watch this space!

Date: Labour Day – 1 May 2010 (Saturday)
Time: 8.00am to 12.00pm
Venue: Dairy Farm Nature Park, 100 Dairy Farm Road
Fee: Free of charge
Target audience: Families with children aged 9-12

What better way to spend the morning of Labour Day than discovering the wonders of nature and spending quality time with your children? We promise an educational and interactive time of fun-filled activities that your whole family will enjoy.

Some of our activities include:

• A guided walk of Wallace Trail, where many fruit trees and interesting plants can be sighted
• Charades, where participants will learn about the diversity of nature – animals and their unique behaviours
• Dog and Bone, where the conservation message will be brought across to participants
• Flower Identification, where participants will learn how to identify different kinds of flowers and their characteristics
• Scavenger hunt, where participants can appreciate the wonders of nature that can be found in Dairy Farm Nature Park
• Personalised Souvenir-making, where participants can design their own cup, plant seeds in it, and watch their very own plant grow as the days pass

To join in the fun, email nature.trailblazers@gmail.com, or call 81801601/91551644. We will be more than happy to answer any enquiries and provide more information about our Nature Adventure Walk. Please show your support for our first ever public Nature Adventure Walk (previously only open to schools) by indicating your interest by 17 April 2010 (Saturday).

We look forward to your enthusiastic participation!

The Trailblazers

Camp objectives:

(1)    To stimulate children’s interest in interacting with nature.

(2)    To instil in children the desire to conserve nature.

(3)    To increase children’s understanding of their natural environment.

(4)    To enable children to apply school-based knowledge to real life   
          experiences and encounters.

(5)    To promote the importance of nature through the emphasis of  
          experiential learning.

(6)    Recognise the fact that Singapore is our Homeland and hence as
          citizens, we must and should know her natural history, in particular
          Dairy Farm.

The camp will allow children to get closer to nature to explore scientific aspects of the natural environment in a very enjoyable and authentic way. On top of that, they will learn about the interesting history of the Dairy Farm. Our Nature walks conducted in 2009 proved to be exciting and informative, and the Get Wild! Camp includes the best of these activities, as well as new and engaging activities. Hence we would like to extend our invitation to Primary 4 to 6 students to participate in this camp.

Get Wild! Camp 2010 will be held on 13 March (Saturday), from 8.30am – 2.30pm, at Wallace Education Centre, located in Dairy Farm Nature Park (100 Dairy Farm Road). The camp fee is $3, which can be paid on the day of the camp. Lunch and refreshments will be provided, so if you have any special dietary needs, please let us know.

If you are interested in participating in this camp, please email lai-jieru@hotmail by 10 March, Wednesday. More information such as how to get there and what to bring will be included in a reply to your email.

We look forward to your positive reply!

The Trailblazers

The Trailblazers team was very fortunate to participate in such an admirable cause on 16th January 2010 at the National Library. As our project aims to educate the young on the natural environment, we set up an exhibition booth under the Roots & Shoots Group Singapore.

We were at the exhibition hall from 10am to 10pm, where we introduced our project to fellow AHF participants as well as members of the public. The visitors generally showed a high level of interest for our cause. We conversed with many people with a similar passion for Nature, and managed to acquire contacts for further updates and collaborations. There were also people who signed up for our Nature Adventure Walk itself. The Trailblazers team were most pleased when our booth visitors praised our project for its originality and significance to society. Our team was glad to be able to extend our project’s outreach, as we managed to communicate our cause on a different platform, and reach out to a more diverse audience.

Not only did we inform other people about our cause, we also learnt much more about various philanthropic and environmental projects all over the world. Our team had a lot of fun with the Reverse Vending Machine – a device that automatically recycles used drink cans. There were meaningful panel discussions held, such as ‘Fight Climate Change with Diet Change’ by NUS Students Against Violation of the Earth, which educated the audience on how our current meat-filled diet is drastically harming the environment. Individuals from philanthropic organizations, such as Mark Philpott from the Humaneity Group, gave inspiring speeches on serving one’s community. Upon listening to such speeches, our team felt very enlightened by their respective causes and inspired by their passion for these causes. We are now more driven to bring our project to greater heights and further our involvement in the community.

The Trailblazers team is very thankful for this opportunity to participate in such a meaningful forum. Not only did we extend our project’s outreach, we also were inspired by other organizations. If given the chance, we would love to go for a similar event again!

With the enthusiasm of the students and the determination of the Trailblazers team, our NAW went very smoothly indeed. This was despite the day’s condition – the sun was sweltering hot, and the mosquitoes seemed to swarm us at every opportunity. However, this was easily solved by taking a few breaks along the way, so that the pupils can rest and have snacks. Even though doing this took up more time, we know that ultimately, the welfare of the children is most important.

The children all had positive comments regarding our Nature Adventure Walk. One boy had told a Trailblazers member that he found nature ‘boring’, and ‘spent most of (his) time playing computer games’. However, at the end of the NAW, he described the experience as being ‘quite fun’. This is an example of the attitude we have during this project: We understand that children are unable to gain an appreciation of nature within 3 hours, and therefore that is not our aim. What we strive to do is present nature in a fun and fascinating manner, such that even if they are not suddenly devoted nature enthusiasts, they can still leave with a heightened interest in the natural world.

Their teacher-in-charge, Ms Michelle Tan, was very impressed with our Nature Adventure Walk, and hopes to collaborate with us for future learning journeys as well. Here is what she had to say: The good intermix of games, art, hands-on planting and scientific theory was one of the most engaging nature programmes we have experienced. Well done!

Pictures of the students participating in our NAW were also put up on their blog for public viewing. They may be accessed here: http://girlsbrigade43rdcompany.blogspot.com/

The Trailblazers team is very glad for this opportunity to serve the younger generation once again! Special thanks go Ms Michelle Tan, who have agreed for us to conduct the trail and made arrangements for this activity to take place, as well as the six participants for their positive outlook and enthusiasm!

Trailblazers arrived on Thursday (19/11/09) for the set-up of our booth, showcasing posters about our project, a scrapbook, a video, a 3-dimensional map of our Nature Adventure Walk, teaching materials and publicity materials such as postcards of a map of the Wallace Education Centre, badges, t-shirts, namecards and calendars.

On Friday (20/11/09), we had an interview with the evaluators, telling them more about our project and showcasing our scrapbook and our display. Finally, on Saturday (21/11/09), there was a CmPS fair where the public visited our booths. Trailblazers managed to sell our project to the public, and gave away calendars, namecards, and also managed to get the contact details of many primary school teachers and children.

Lastly, the results of the CmPS National Finals were announced. We are proud to announce that Trailblazers has clinched the second prize for the CmPS Middle Division category, and will be representing Singapore in the International Conference next year in Wisconsin.

We would like to thank the following for their valuable advice and input:
our mentors, Mrs Jonathan-Tan Hai Nee and Mr Sean Yeoh, for their unwavering support;
Ms Tan Beng Chiak, for her continual guidance;
Dr Shawn Lum, for familiarizing us with the history and plant species in the Wallace trail;
Ms Sim Chor Miang, for collaborating with us for the Nature Learning Camp;
Mrs Lee Chick Cheng, for providing us with several participants for our NAW;
National Parks, for letting us utilize their facilities;
students of Tunku Kurshiah College, Malaysia, for allowing us to share our project with them and offering to bring our project back to their country;
all participants of our NAW, for being ever so enthusiastic.

Trailblazers display booth

For more information about our project, please go here. If you have any queries, please drop us an email at nature.trailblazers@gmail.com, and we will be more than happy to address them.

The Trailblazers

Ms Tan introduced Trailblazers to the different groups of specialists, citing our Nature Adventure Walk (NAW) as a contribution to WELL, and publicizing our NAW to them, extending invitations to them to arrange for their primary school students to participate in our NAW.

After introductions and explanations on the WELL committee, it was time for some hands-on activities – a guided tour of the Wallace Trail by Dr Shawn Lum and Mr Lim Cheng Puay. Trailblazers followed Dr Shawn Lum for a short walk in the Wallace trail, where he introduced the history of WELL as well as some background information of Sir Alfred Russel Wallace. Dr Lum pointed out several interesting plant species throughout the trail, and we even spotted a rare type of fungi that was in a shape of a cauliflower!

While walking the trail, Trailblazers managed to introduce our project to Ms Durai, a journalist with The Straits Times. We gave her a brief overview of our project, about why we chose to work on the problem of children not having enough interaction with nature and to conduct NAW as a solution, our station activities in NAW, how our trial runs of NAW went, as well as our achievements and feedback thus far.

The groups of specialists then broke into their separate groups and discussed about the utilization of WELL, after which some teachers approached our team to learn more about our project, which we introduced using our 3D map of our trail in WELL, our NAW booklet and photographs of our trial runs of NAW as well as our trip to WELL with Malaysian students and our NAW during the Nature Learning Camp. Some primary school teachers were interested in arranging for their students to participate in our NAW and left their contact details.

Mrs Julie Hoo, Principal of RGS, speaking to the groups of specialists

Ms Tan Beng Chiak speaking to the groups of specialists

Ms Durai, a journalist with The Straits Times, sitting at our booth

Dr Shawn Lum bringing us on a guided walk in the Wallace Trail

Trailblazers is glad for this opportunity to publicize our project to different groups of specialists and also to learn about the future utilization of WELL. We look forward to future collaborations with the different groups of specialists, especially the primary school teachers.

We have been receiving positive feedback from primary school teachers about our NAW, and we would be happy to extend our invitation to the public to sign up their children for our NAW. For more information about our NAW, please go here.

The Trailblazers

After quick introductions and preparations, we began our walk! We were able to conduct our Wallace Trail and Unnatural Walk stations outdoors, but due to sudden rainfall, we were forced to proceed with Dog and Bone indoors.

Nevertheless, it went on very smoothly and the children had a great time participating in our NAW. It was a huge success! We took countless photos with the participants and even interviewed them. They all had very positive feedback regarding our trail, and expressed interest in future nature-related activities. Through this NAW, Trailblazers got to know the participants well, and everyone enjoyed themselves thoroughly and could not bear to leave. At the end of it all, Ms Sim Chor Miang, the organizer of this NLC, thanked us for contributing to the success of the NLC and congratulated us for a job well done.

Trailblazers is extremely thankful for the opportunity to participate in this NLC, and would like to thank Ms Sim for kindly inviting us to be a part of it. Thanks also goes out to Ms Tan Beng Chiak for helping us during the NLC and throughout the entire process of designing our NAW, and of course, all the 8 fun and enthusiastic participants!

Trailblazers with participants at NLC

The Trailblazers

Today Trailblazers wants to share with you the rich and exciting history of Dairy Farm Nature Park, of which WELL (where we conduct our walks) is a part of. :D :D The plot of land which is now Dairy Farm Nature Park has gone through a lot of transformation throughout the years and it shows clearly how Singapore developed over time.

Do you ever wonder why the Wallace Education Centre is named like that? Why Wallace and not Charles or Frederick or Bob? Well, it’s because of Alfred Russell Wallace! He was Charles Darwin’s good friend and helped to come up with many ideas in the theory of evolution. In the 1850s when he was exploring the Malay Archipelago, he was amazed by the amount of biodiversity found in this small patch of forest that is now the Dairy Farm Nature Park! He was intrigued by the many beetles and butterflies and he often trekked through the forest alone collecting specimens, even in spite of tigers lurking around. How brave, what passion!

In the 1920s and 1930s, Dairy Farm was not a dairy farm at all! Instead, it was a pig farm! A few large Berkshire boars were imported and crossbred with local sows, and they quickly multiplied into 1200 pigs in 3 years. However, this farm could not last long. In 1930, an epidemic of swine fever (80 years earlier than swine flu!) broke out on the farm and 900 pigs died.

At that time, supply of fresh milk for Magnolia came from small dairies chiefly under the control of the Bengali community, keeping Indian breeds and Murra buffaloes. However, milk was of inferior quality and “a thin bluish-white liquid not infrequently flavored with cow dung and usually speckled with dead flies”. The cows were “sad and emaciated… wandering aimlessly around the waste land barely nourished by the coarse and wiry buffalo grass”. It was definitely not something anyone would enjoy.

Since the pig farm was no longer sustainable, the next best project was milk production. It was decided that Cold Storage should manufacture its own milk products to ensure hygiene and quality. A free-growing hybrid grass was found to be comparable to grass in temperate dairy farms, and was used as food for the cows instead of local grass species, which weren’t palatable. The milk was sold in nostalgic tiga penjuru or pyramid shaped Tetra Pak cartons which were very convenient. The people living there also planted many food trees like durian, curry and coffee among others.

The old tetra pak milk packaging.

Eventually however, the place was abandoned. There are still many houses and traces of old pots and stone lying around today, which were once used by the people then! Now, the plot of land has been declared a Nature Park and it is frequently visited by people of all ages.

This is one of the abandoned houses. Haunted?

Hope you’ve learnt much more about WELL through our post today!

Signing off,
The Trailblazers