Oscar is a little goat. He lives on a farm in a small town in Mpumalanga. He is very brave and adventurous. In his herd there are 20 goats. Twelve of them are adults and 8 of them are young goats.

Oscar has been on an adventure every year since he came here 5 years ago. How many adventures has he already had? The adventure from 3 years ago is the most important one. It’s the last adventure he went on with his cattle friends.

In the past a herd of 20 cattle lived with them. One of them was Oscar’s best friend, Shola. They had a lot of fun in the 2 years they lived together. All of them went on adventures together. They were a big group of 40 good friends.

But Oscar’s best friend was Shola. They wanted to explore their village. On their adventure 3 years ago they walked through rivers and fields... And suddenly they had a brilliant idea.

They wanted to give all of their friends a gift. How many gifts would they need? They searched and finally they found many colourful threads. They wanted to make friendship bracelets for everyone as a sign of their friendship.

They needed 40 friendship bracelets. Oscar and Shola divided the work. Each of them made half of those 40 bracelets. So both of them had to make 20 bracelets. They needed two threads per bracelet. How many threads did both of them need?

When they were finished they were very happy and proud. They gave each member of the two herds a friendship bracelet. Everyone was very happy.

One day Shola’s herd disappears... Nobody knows where they have gone. Before that day the farm had 40 animals. Now there are half of them, just 20 animals left. How many animals does Shola’s herd have?

Oscar searches everywhere for Shola. He gets help from his herd. They divide into four groups. How many goats are in each group?

Every group searches, but they do not find anything. Oscar is very sad. One day he decides to leave the farm for his annual adventure to find Shola. But before he leaves, he eats as much as possible...

He eats two slices of bread. Then he drinks some water. After that he eats another slice of bread. Then after some more water he eats five more slices. How many slices of bread does he eat in total?

The sun starts to rise which is his sign to leave. The journey begins.

Oscar’s journey starts in his small hometown in Mpumalanga. The first obstacle is a gap in the ground. The gap is too wide to jump over. It is 1 meter wide. Oscar can only jump half that distance, 50 centimeters...

He finds some branches that he can use as a bridge. The branches are 1.5 meters long but they are not wide enough. The bridge needs to be 1 meter wide so he can walk over it. The branches are only 20 centimeters wide.

He needs to lay some branches next to each other. How many branches does he need to lay next to each other to get a total of 100 centimeters? He lays down 5 branches to build his bridge. When he crosses over the bridge he is relieved.

Unfortunately the next challenge comes shortly after. Oscar walks through a forest. He looks up at the sky and sees some dark clouds. There will be a thunderstorm soon. He knows that it’s dangerous to be in the forest when there is a storm.

Oscar runs out of the forest as fast as possible. He gets out before the thunderstorm starts. But he is out of breath. He takes a break. And he thinks about what could help him now. He needs to drink some fresh water because it’s very hot.

He looks for some water to drink. In the afternoon he finally sees a river. There are some very large rocks in the river. They are bigger than Oscar so he thinks he can easily walk on them.

Oscar walks over the rocks. He trips because the rocks are wet and almost falls into the raging river. Fortunately he doesn’t but he sees a horrible, huge crocodile right underneath him. He fears that the crocodile will eat him if he falls.

He screams for help. The crocodile opens its mouth and Oscar can see his big white teeth. Normally crocodiles have up to 70 teeth. Oscar can only see 45 teeth. How many teeth has the crocodile lost already?

Oscar hears something. He hears footsteps. “There must be some other animals,” he thinks. “Maybe they can help me.” Oscar screams until he sees someone. It is a cow, like the cattle who lived with him on his farm.

The cow tells him that he has to get to the other side. Oscar knows that it isn’t possible, the river is too wide. The cattle realizes that too and says to Oscar that he should wait a bit. He leaves but comes back really fast.

He says to Oscar that they’re going to throw a rope so he can climb over the river. He throws the rope and after one attempt Oscar catches it. The rope is made out of different parts with colourful threads. Each part is 10 centimeters long.

The rope looks familiar to him. But before he can think about it any longer the cow tells him to put it around a rock and climb over to him. The river is 2 metres and 10 centimetres wide, the rope is only 2 meters long.

Oscar remembers that he has a friendship bracelet which is also 10 centimetres long. He fastens it to the rope. Now it’s long enough. How many parts are now fastened together so that the rope is long enough (2 meters and 10 centimeters)?

Oscar crosses the river to the cow and is very happy when he reaches the other side. He thanks the cow and suddenly stops. Behind the cow he recognizes his best friend Shola who he has been missing for 3 years.

Full of happiness he runs over to him. When Shola sees Oscar, his face lights up. They are so happy and start hugging each other. Then Oscar realises that the other cattle are also from his farm. He has many questions about what happened.

The cattle tell Oscar that they didn’t want to leave the farm. But one day, when they were grazing, a wild dog chased them away. They ran for their lives. When they escaped the wild dog, they wanted to return to the farm.

But they ran far away from the farm and could not find the way back.
They missed their goat friends every day.
So Oscar suggests that all of the 20 cattle should come back home to the farm with him.

The goat herd is surprised when Oscar returns with 20 cattle. But when they realise that they are their old friends, they are overjoyed. They are now reunited with the 20 cattle and are a group of 40 friends again, just like before.