Lesson 6: Exploring a Playground
This lesson is locked
The lessons open up once you have listened to the course introduction, Introduction: Daniel Kish on Echolocation. It is about five and a half minutes long, and it explains what echolocation is and where it came from — everything in this lesson builds on it.
About this lesson
This is the course’s first full, real navigation exercise. Nathan approaches an object he hasn’t announced, tracking it with clicks as he walks up to it. When he arrives, he identifies it by touch — a slide — and then reasons like a navigator: if there’s a slide, there must be more play structure around it. He walks the structure, finding a wall, poles, and a way up, showing how clicking and touching work together when exploring somewhere new.
Listen for
- The structure growing in Nathan’s clicks as he approaches — it’s audible in front of him before he touches it.
- The moment of arrival: “here it is, right in front of me.”
- Deduction while exploring: a slide implies a play structure; a pole implies something the pole holds up.
- The clip from on top: claps from up high sound different — more open below, structure close around.
Clip: claps from the play structure
Try it yourself
Visit a playground you know with a family member or friend at a quiet time. Have them start you a short distance from a structure, facing it. Click your way toward it, stop before you touch it, then confirm with your hands. Walk around the structure the way Nathan does — click, touch, name what you find, and build the map as you go. Then try it at a playground you don’t know.
Transcript
Lightly edited for readability.
[Recording check: “Take one, whenever you’re ready.”]
So we’re out here, and we’re about to approach an object. I want you to listen to the clicks and what I’m getting back from them as I walk up to this object. [He clicks while approaching.] If you listen carefully, you might hear it out here in front of me. Now — here it is, right in front of me. Let’s see what it is. [He reaches out and touches it.] It feels like a slide. And if it’s a slide, then there must be other things around it.
Here’s a pole — so there must be some other stuff here. Whenever you encounter something like this, you might want to explore it yourself. Try walking around it the way I’m doing here, feeling around to see what’s here. Here’s a wall — maybe if you wanted to climb that wall, you could try that. Here’s a pole… and let’s see what’s around the pole… and that feels like a way to get up onto the play structure.
Now that you’ve heard how you can navigate around a structure, I want you to try that for yourself, at a playground near you. All right — that was it.
[Nathan climbs up onto the structure and records a few claps from the top — those are the short clip below the main player.]