NAVIGATION skills didn’t fail Pittencrieff Primary School pupils as they impressed at a national orienteering competition before the summer break.

Teams of youngsters from both Primary 5 and Primary 7 travelled to Drumpellier Country Park, Coatbridge, for the Scottish Schools Orienteering Association (SSOA) Festival after achieving success at Dunfermline and West Fife Sports Council’s Primary 5-7 festival in Pittencrieff Park.

The talented kids were among 42 schools who took part in the event, which is used by the SSOA to encourage schools to introduce pupils to orienteering through their own curriculum.

Orienteering is an exciting foot race – often through forests – that sees participants navigate from one point to another on a predefined course printed on an orienteering map, with the aim being to navigate around all the points in the shortest time.

Pittencrieff pupils have impressed consistently at the annual festival held in the Glen and they continued in the same vein in Lanarkshire, with the Primary 7 girls placing third and the school finishing fifth overall behind Gargieston Primary, George Heriot’s Junior School, Bun-sgoil Ghàidhlig Inbhir Nis (Inverness Gaelic Primary School) and Comrie Primary.

Ahead of the event, teacher Fiona Wiggall said: “We have excessively good pupils in P5, P6 and P7 at orienteering.

“There are a lot of different skills, like maths, that they can use within the curriculum and, because this is more practical, they can see why they use it.

“They’ve shown fantastic skills.”