Getting By (The Milk Cap Game)
This game presents the campers
with the issue of whether animals are specialists or generalists in their
diet. Use differently colored milk jug
lids as the food resources for this game. You can ask friends to save lids for
you, or make friends with someone who works for the local dairy. Assign a color to each of the campers and
have them count out twenty caps of a particular color. Now, have someone distribute the caps in a
grassy area, particularly in a loop if you can find such a place in your
camp. While someone is spreading the
caps around, assign a color or multiple colors to the campers. These colors are the allowable food resources
that the campers can find for the upcoming round of the game. For instance, one camper might be assigned
white, but another camper can gather any color cap.
Announce that the campers must
find ten caps of their assigned color(s) in order to survive. Note to the campers that they are allowed to
gather more than they need in any given round.
Give the campers a "ready, set, go," to start the game.
After a minute or two, call
the campers back in to you and ask if anyone did not find enough food caps to
survive. Most of the campers who did not
survive will be those who were assigned only one color, particularly one that
was especially rare to begin with.
Repeat the game for another round or two, reassigning colors each time
so that no camper has a hard time in each round.
In the last round, say that a
piece of the habitat which provides the food has just been destroyed. Therefore, some of the milk caps will need to
be removed, before the next round.
Remove twenty or more lids and play again. In this round, the specialists will have an
even more difficult time. Specialists
will be hurt more than generalists will be by the loss of habitat.
Debrief the activity by asking
who had an easier time surviving, animals who could eat lots of things or only
one item. Explain that specialists are
therefore much more prone to decline when humans remove habitat, because their
diet can not shift to other food sources.
Ask for examples, such as pandas, snail kites, and so on. Inevitably, a camper or two will return with
pocket full of food while there are still some animals starving. Use that instance as an opportunity to talk
about hunger and how the greed of some humans prevents others' from having
enough to eat. You might also observe
some sharing in this game. Bring notice
to that sharing during this time and emphasize that God's will is to have
humans share resources so that all have a fair amount.