Designing an NC Zoo Scavenger Hunt
The Education Staff at the NC Zoo wants your help with developing/designing a Scavenger Hunt that they
can share with Zoo visitors. The Scavenger Hunts must be about “Mammals of the Zoo”. It can be digital,
linked to a phone app., paper, or video. You will be graded on the quality of your Scavenger Hunt, clues (are
they understandable/doable), criteria provided, and if students can actually do it. HAVE FUN!!!
You must include the following for your scavenger hunt…
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Theme - First of all, pick a theme or topic as this will affect how to do the rest of the steps. The theme relates to
the items that the players will need to find. (are you going to focus on mammals in North America? Africa?
Predators?)
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Type - The next step in designing a scavenger hunt is to decide on what type of hunt you want to do. It’ll usually
either be an item, photo or video scavenger hunt. It can be fun or educational, but always be appropriate.
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Task -Players have to perform tasks, using clues. This is usually played as a photo or video
scavenger hunt so that there’s proof that the tasks have been completed.
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Photo - Players have to take pictures of as many items or tasks on the list as they can.
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Video - Players are given tasks they have to complete that require filming rather than just having
photos taken.
Age Group – Make sure that you decide on the age group before you start the design process. It needs to be on
the level that you have chosen.
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Location - Next, pick a location. This may be obvious based on the theme (e.g. Zoo Scavenger Hunt), but other
options could be whole zoo, North America, Africa, etc…
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Clues/List - Provide the players / teams with a set of clues to help them find what is needed. In addition to clues,
you could add bonus tasks to make it even more fun. The tasks are scored slightly differently in that players earn
the bonus points based on their creativity, ingenuity, humor, etc, rather than simply for completing it. (weirdest
statue, tallest animal, etc..)
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Time Limit - Set a time limit that they have to return by. It can be worth imposing a penalty of -1 point for each
minute a player is late – this discourages cheating by spending longer on the scavenger hunt than others.
 Rules – Each scavenger hunt must include specific rules, such as where they can and can’t go. If you’re doing
this with a youth group or for a children’s birthday party and you’re going to be out in public, it might also be worth
setting expectations for their behavior.
 Quantity/Quality - You must have at least 15-20 clues. You will also be graded on the quality of the clues you
make. Do not just tell them to take a picture with the lions. There needs to be actual clues to guide them to where
they need to go and what they need to learn/see.
See the next page for examples of scavenger hunts