Update 23: How to Grow a Goat

Ready for something different?

I’m delighted to share our new project: How to Grow a Goat.

The new and free app will give families daily activity ideas that help kids to play, explore, and spend more time outdoors.

Things like:

• See how far you can get without being seen by a bird.
• Walk, wheel or cycle from one side of town to the other.
• Make a flowerpot nature reserve.
• Create a walking route with a special theme. Guide someone on it.
• Watch sunrise from the top of a hill.
• See how far you can get in an hour, fuelled only by food.
• Play a different outdoor game every day for a week.

Designed for kids of all ages, it will spark imaginations and champion good ways to grow-up active, curious and kind. And yes, there will be lots of activities that nurture a love for self-powered travel.

Imagine the potential cultural impact if thousands of families across the UK started using this app – all receiving the same activities at the same time. Imagine all the conversations, adventures and opportunities that would generate.

We’re crowdfunding to help make it happen – with the goal of reaching families by contacting every school in the UK.

Please take a look at the How to Grow a Goat Crowdfunder →

The app will be free – but we need help to get the word out, to create lots of activities and build the Android version.

For every £1 we raise, we’ll be able to contact another school and invite them to share the free app with their families. We’ve already raised enough to contact around a quarter of all primary schools in the UK – and our ambition is to reach every school in the country. We would love your help to reach even more.

And thanks to the Aviva Foundation up to £250 of your first donation can be match funded! Pledge £50 and they could match it with £50 – putting £100 towards the crowdfunder – and enabling us to contact 100 schools.

What is How to Grow a Goat?

At Good Ways, we want to make it easier for everyone to get out, be active and explore – whether that’s walking, running, wheeling, cycling, riding, paddling or simply discovering somewhere new.

But having great routes to follow is only part of the picture.

We also want children to grow up feeling curious about the world outside their front door. To enjoy exploring. To play outside. To have the confidence to get places under their own steam and gradually expand the geography of their lives.

That’s where How to Grow a Goat comes in.

Each day, the app will offer families a choice of activities to try. Some can be done at home or close to home. Others are designed for families to try while they’re already out and about.

Some activities will take five minutes. Others could turn into proper adventures.

The idea isn’t to programme every moment of childhood. Quite the opposite. It’s about offering the right prompt at the right moment — something that might spark curiosity, play, confidence or a new adventure.

Open the app. Find something worth doing. Put the phone away.

There are only 216 months of childhood. We’d like to make a few more of those months full of exploring, playing, moving and discovering.

How does this fit with Good Ways?

Both Good Ways and How to Grow a Goat help people find good ways to get outside, explore the world and discover new places.

How to Grow a Goat takes a lot of the philosophy behind Good Ways and applies it to childhood: encouraging curiosity, active travel, outdoor play, exploration and a deeper relationship with the places around us.

It will also give families lots of ideas for things to do while they are out exploring places.

Made with good people

Like Good Ways, How to Grow a Goat is being built collaboratively.

The app has been developed thanks to our special relationship with Gary Ismay at Good Binary, who we’ve worked with for years.

The activities are being collaboratively created and reviewed with our friends at Outdoor People CIC, bringing their experience of children, families, outdoor play and adventure into the project.

And the brilliant visual identity and design has been developed by Anton at MakeDo Design, who is also working with us on the Good Ways apps.

It’s a lovely example of people we trust bringing different skills together around a shared idea.

Help us reach families across the UK

The Crowdfunder will help us create hundreds more activities, develop the app further and reach families across the country through schools.

For every £1 raised, we can contact another school.

We’ve already raised enough to contact around one in four UK primary schools. The bigger ambition is to reach them all.

Imagine thousands of children and families around the country trying the same activities at the same time – sparking conversations, adventures and new ways of seeing the places where they live.

If that sounds like something worth helping to make happen, please back the Crowdfunder and help us grow it.

Back How to Grow a Goat on Crowdfunder →

Thank you!