Nims the Goat and the One-Step Rule

Nims is a small, sure-footed young goat with a curious face and neat little hooves, and Nims LOVES to run a good obstacle course. Up the hills, across the bridges, all the way to the flag at the end. But Nims has one important thing you must know about him, and it is the key to everything.

Nims can only climb UP one step at a time.

Going DOWN, Nims is brilliant - he can hop off a high ledge, light as anything, tippety-tap, and land soft on his hooves. Down, down, down - no drop is too deep to hop DOWN.

But climbing UP is different. Up, Nims can manage exactly ONE step. One block high. If the next bit is one step up, Nims springs up it easily. But if there is a deep, deep pit, or a wall two or three steps tall - Nims stands at the bottom, looks up, and simply cannot climb it. He is not cross. He just tips his head and says, “Ooh - that’s too deep for me. I’m stuck.”

So when you build a course for Nims, this is the whole idea: you make it so every climb is only ONE step at a time. If your course has a deep pit, you BRIDGE it - fill it up, or lay steps - so Nims can climb out one step at a time. Do that, and Nims runs the whole course, all the way to the flag, easy as you like.

That’s what “fair” means here. A fair course is one Nims can actually finish. An unfair course has a trap - a drop too deep to climb out of - where Nims gets stuck through no fault of his own.

“I’m not asking for it to be easy,” Nims says kindly. “I love a good challenge! I just need it to be FAIR. Bridge the deep pits, so every step up is one step, and I can do the rest.”

That is Nims’s whole steady idea.

I can only climb up one step at a time - so if a drop is too deep, I get stuck. Build it fair for me.

A grown-up can play too! Be Nims together. Pretend to climb some stairs, but only ONE step up at a time - slow and steady. Now pretend there’s a giant gap or a wall three steps tall. Can you climb it in one step? No! You’d be stuck. That’s an unfair spot. How could you fix it, so every step up is just one? Talk about it together.

When you finally build Nims a fair course and he runs it all the way to the flag, he does a happy little hoof-kick and beams at you. “You built it JUST fair,” he says warmly. “Every climb one step - so I could do it. Thank you for thinking of ME.”

One step up at a time. Bridge the deep pits. That’s Nims.