Mountain School Discovery Trip: snow, spring or autumn week in the Vercors

The Pied Vert mountain leaders support teachers in setting up their school discovery trip in a mountain environment.

We help you find accommodation among the school centres of our massif. We will share the strengths of each option according to your project (proximity to nature, to a historic or heritage site, quality of catering, and so on) before you choose.

Do you already have a village in mind that fits your project? Autrans, Villard-de-Lans, Rencurel or Saint-Julien-en-Vercors.

Then, and above all, we help you build your schedule of educational mountain activities to match your teaching objectives.

We offer a wide range of winter and summer activities to discover the nature and heritage of the Vercors. We also design outings that pick up themes already covered in class and reflect the season of your stay. Summer, autumn, winter or spring all open onto different discoveries. The Vercors and its history can also serve as a thread: prehistory, French Resistance, the water cycle, and more.

Want to add a more technical outing such as canyoning, climbing or mountain biking? We can recommend Vercors sports educators known for the quality of their teaching approach.

Activities and outings led by the Pied Vert mountain leaders are designed in line with the French common base of knowledge, skills and culture.

Want help organising your school discovery trip in the mountains? Reach us by phone 07 66 64 90 96 or by email contactpiedvert.com pbagnpg@cvrqireg.pbz.

School pack: educational activities

Available by email on request: contactpiedvert.com pbagnpg@cvrqireg.pbz

Excerpt below.

Activities by theme:

Natural environments
Snow and snowshoeing
Outdoor physical activities
Heritage
Mixed discoveries
Evening sessions

Natural environments (wildlife, flora, ecosystem)

Wildlife: the mountain animals

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn A playful outing on the trail of the Vercors animals. With teaching tools (skulls, feathers, antlers, horns, photographs, etc.), learn to identify them, then track them by reading the signs they leave behind. Several sessions recommended.

Flora: the life of the forest

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn A walk in the forest: discover the tree families and species of the Vercors, how plants work, and the forest ecosystem. Playful and sensory approach.

Wildlife: track casting

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn In class, with several teaching aids, understand how animals move and discover their adaptations to their environments. Plaster casts are made from animal paw matrices that the children can take home.

Wildlife: introductions and reintroductions in the Vercors Regional Park

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn With a slideshow, discover the local wildlife of the Vercors Regional Park: which animals disappeared? Why and how did they return over time?

Land Art

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Experience nature through ephemeral art and the senses.

Geology: the formation of the Vercors

School level Middle and High school
Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Through a slideshow, follow the story of the Vercors from the Tethys Sea, through the formation of the Alps and the karstic massifs. Learn to recognise rocks and the different erosion mechanisms.

Insects under the magnifier

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn With a magnifier, discover insects: who are they, where do they live? Understand their life cycle and how social insects work, through playful teaching tools.

On the trail of the wolf

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Wiped out at the end of the 19th century, the wolf is back on the Vercors plateau. The packs make headlines, but do we really know this predator? With teaching aids, learn why its return matters for humans and pastoralism as well as for nature and its ecosystems.

Wildlife: observing the wild animals of the Vercors

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn In late afternoon, at the right time for a hide, observe mountain wildlife in its natural environment. Examples: chamois, deer rut, marmot...

Flora: the life cycle of a plant

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Discover how plants work and their life cycle: photosynthesis, mountain vegetation belts, and so on.

Wildlife: birds

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn With binoculars, discover the birds: who they are, where they live, why they migrate. Understand their life cycle and how birds function, through playful teaching aids.

Snow and snowshoes

Snowshoe outing

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter A playful snowshoe outing to discover the surroundings (nature, heritage, and so on).

Risk in snowy mountains

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter Experience the dangers tied to cold and snow in a playful way (avalanche transceiver searches, DVA). Introduction to snow science.

Wildlife: animal life in winter

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Discover the strategies developed by animals to survive the winter (hibernation, winter dormancy, camouflage, group living, etc.) with teaching aids.

Building an igloo

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter Depending on snow conditions, build an igloo together (cooperation) with the right method for the day.

Outdoor physical activities

Introduction to orienteering

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
(only Cycle 3, Middle and High school)Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Discover map reading using the area around the classroom, plus an introduction to orienteering.

Advanced orienteering

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Sharpen map reading skills and acquire advanced techniques (compass, bearings, azimuth, triangulation). Several sessions recommended.

Heritage

The history of the Vercors villages

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Guided tour of a Vercors village: its history, its traditional architecture, its inhabitants and their way of life.

1939-1945: along the trails of the French Resistance

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Discover the life of the Resistance fighters on the Vercors plateau during the Second World War (teaching aids).

Reading the landscape: understanding the terrain, its wild environments and its developments

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn From a viewpoint, with teaching tools and games, learn to observe and understand the mountain landscape: its formation, its evolution, its biocenosis and how it works.

Mixed discoveries

Day hike

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn A day on the trail towards a viewpoint, with discoveries of the many specificities of the Vercors and the ecosystems we cross.

Nature through the senses

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn A playful sensory discovery in nature.

Bivouac in the wild

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Set up a full nature immersion.

Hut

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Build a hut together and live a nature experience.

Build a nest box

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Learn about bird habitats, understand their constraints, and build a nest box (one per pupil).

Composting

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Spring, Summer, Autumn Observe the world beneath our feet and the making of "soil". Identify the small creatures living in the earth. Understand how composting works.

Wild Escape Game

School level Cycle 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Dive into a fictional world for a quest mixing navigation, environmental riddles and cooperation. More on the escape game.

Evening sessions

Storytelling

School level Cycle 1, 2, 3, Middle and High school
Outdoor / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Discover the Vercors and the mountains (wildlife, flora, heritage, and so on) through told stories.

Slideshow: mountain animals

School level Cycle 2, 3, Middle and High school
In a refuge / Indoor
Seasons Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn Build on a field outing with a slideshow about mountain animals (many sub-themes available, playful slideshow with small games to test what we have learnt).

School Discovery Trip in the Mountains