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Working with the "New Scout" (11-Year Old Scout) Patrol Intro Congratulations on being called to one of the most wonderfull callings in the church! The transition between primary and young men is an exciting time to be involved in the life of a young man. He's old enough, strong enough, and excited enough to accomplish some wonderful things. He's also making some pretty important decisions - for example, about now is when he is starting to make decisions about going on a mission, getting married in the temple, and other life changing events. You are going to be part of these decisions… so how can you make it a wonderful experience (for both him and you)? Get a copy of at least four books: The Boy Scout Handbook, The Scoutmaster's Handbook, the Requirements Book for the current year, and the LDS-BSA handbook (a thin green booklet). The Boy Scout Handbook will have a lot of the stuff that you'll be teaching the young men over the next year. The Scoutmaster's Handbook will give you a lot of information about how the program should be run. The Requirements Book has the requirements for all the current ranks and merit badges. The LDS-BSA handbook talks about how scouts and church work together and includes a few rules for the 11-year old activities. Oh, and while you're at it, read all these books! Take some notes! (Yeah, I know, if you head to the scout office you will find a bunch of other neat books to purchase, but at least these four will get you started.) Wanna know how to run things right! If at all possible, go get some training. At a minimum take "fast start" training - a video that you watch or you can find it on the internet as well. Also take "Youth Protection Training" - also available on the internet. Before you go swimming and boating you'll also need "Safe Swim Defense" and "Safety Afloat" - but those can usually wait a bit (especially if it's January in Iowa). There is also "New Leader Essentials" and "Position Specific Training" that is taught a couple of times each year by the local scouting district. They will help a lot too. Two things to remember… first, don't just assume that because you were a scout back in the last century, that you know how the program is supposed to operate - many (most?) new leaders are surprised to find out that the "scouting" they did as a youth was more an invention of their leaders than what they were supposed to have been doing. (Now if you choose to do your own thing, well go right ahead, but please don't call it scouting and don't try to convince the boys or parents that it is scouting either.) Second, my experience has been that while training does take some time, but is an investment that pays off wonderfully in the future. So what is the goal here? The primary goal of the first year is to have a lot of fun and learn scouting and leadership skills. Translating this into actual skills development, a good goal during the first year of scouting is to offer the skills and leadership training to allow a young man to achieve the rank of First Class. That means that most of the activities will be pretty basic - for you - but probably not for the young men. Now… some of the young men will achieve First Class and some won't, that's their choice. But they all should learn a lot of skills and begin to start working together as a team (soon to be quorum). OK, so how do you make it work…? So how do you make this happen? First, don't be tempted to put the entire group into a forced march towards Tenderfoot, Second Class, and First Class. Since young men will enter and leave on their birthdays, some will be coming and going throughout the year. So what can you do? The young men can work on all three of the first ranks (tenderfoot, second class, first class, simultaneously, so this means that you can work on "themes" that cut across several ranks rather than doing work on one rank, then another, and then the third. For example, First Aid skills are needed for a couple of the ranks so they apply to most of the young men at any point in time. And third, it is good to review, review and review - so don't worry to much about repeating themes throughout the year. If a young man knows his knots - then have him teach others. I've attached a matrix showing the requirements for the ranks side by side arranged by themes. I've also attached a sample calendar that I used once to spread the skills throughout the year. What does a typical meeting look like? Robert Stephenson Smith Baden-Powell (whoa, now there's a name for you), the guy who invented
scouting, taught using a very interesting method at his scout camp. He taught a skill in the morning, then practiced the skill in the afternoon, and then at night talked about the importance of the skill as
applied to real life situations.
This is still how scouting operates. You teach, practice, apply, and talk about skills - with any talking being short and to the point. The young men have been at school all day, they don't need to sit any longer. So a typical meeting will look like this:
So what do we try to do in each of these meeting segments? The pre-meeting gives the young men something to do when they arrive. In a really well organized troop they plan a pre-meeting activity of some type, like a game that you can easily join as additional young men arrive. In most LDS troops the young men just run around the cultural hall getting into trouble and then the adults complain about how hard it is to get the young men into the room when we want scouts to start. The opening consists of repeating the scout oath, law, motto, slogan (see Tenderfoot requirement 7), pledge to the flag, and having a prayer. The patrol leader should lead all this. This is the way that scout meetings start all over the U.S. Oh, and the adult should know the words to the oath, law, motto and slogan or they look really lame. The skill learning and practice is probably the most important section for the 11-year old scouts. This is where they learn a lot of the scouting skills that they will be using for the next 7 years. But don't take up the entire meeting with this segment - because other wise it will be really boring (especially if you have some young men who have already passed off this particular skill). And don't just sit there and talk, and talk, and talk, and talk. It's better to do and do and do and do. The next segment of the meeting is the patrol meeting - this is where you and the young men plan the upcoming activity (where, what, when, how, who, and what to eat). It works best if you spread the planning over several meetings and let the ideas develop over time. For example, start with announcing the next activity and the general goals. Then the next week work on the schedule (when to meet, what to do, when to be home). Then the week after that work on the menu or list of things to bring. Etc. Etc. Next we move into the game/activity when you get to have a lot more fun and physical activity. This is important to all of the young men and critically important to some of the young men (they'll sit through a lot of boring skills if they know a good game is coming up later). This is also something that can often be delegated to one of the young men - have them plan and bring the game. To finish off the meeting you have the closing segment. This consists of making any announcements ("remember to show up on Saturday at 7:00AM with your sack lunch and permission slips"), a scoutmaster's minute, and a closing prayer. The scoutmaster's minute is perhaps the most important part of the meeting. It is a moment (well a minute or so) with a serious thought or story that is often, but not always related to the theme/activity you're working on that month. This is equivalent to Baden-Powell sitting around the fire at the end of the day and telling the scouts why what they worked on that day was important in scouting and also in their lives. This single "minute" can change lives - believe it, it's true, I've seen it happen. By the way, the older young men (12 years and up) should follow the exact same meeting plan as the 11-year old scouts, but they will spend less time on skills (because you did such a good job teaching them) and more time on planning the monthly activity (because it will be more complicated and they will be doing more exciting stuff). Their games will probably also be a bit tougher (rougher?) too. But never, never, never skip the game or the scoutmasters minute. Oh, and one more thing… someone once said that you should never expect your "audience" to remain in their seats "on task" for any more minutes than they are old in years. So if you had been called to teach a bunch of 60 year old High Priests, then they can sit for and hour or so. But 11-year olds, if they sit for 11 minutes, you've probably already gone way too long (remember, they've been at school all day already) - so get up and run around! Outdoor activities other than on week nights? A young man will need 10 activities other than troop/patrol meetings to get to First Class. This means 10 weekend type activities - hiking, swimming, museum visits, biking, etc. In reality, since some young men will miss one or two activities during the year, this means that monthly activities are a must to reach the basic goal for the patrol. In general, these activities will involve only the 11-year old scouts and not the older young men. On occasion, however, the older young men (ages 12+) are doing something where the 11-year old scouts can attend and so it is logical to join with them. For example, they might be going on a hike or a bike ride. Or on occasion they might attend a Friday evening campfire or a special Saturday morning activity following an overnight camp. The 11-year old scouts, however, do not ever camp over night with the older boys (with or without their father present) - check your LDS-BSA handbook if you don't believe me. Look down the road a bit and you'll be a happier person. Remember when you first started to ride a bike and spent most of the time wobbling down the driveway looking at your front tire or at the road just ahead of the bike? Most new riders don't look far enough ahead - in fact one of my sons actually rode his bike straight into a parked car! Once you start riding your bike a lot, then you could look further ahead and see what was coming up - stop signs, holes in the road, cars and trucks, gravel patches, etc. You found that you could ride further, faster, with less energy. It is the same with working with these scouts - if you only plan 24 hours in advance ("Oh my goodness, it's Tuesday and I still don't know what we're doing tomorrow at scouts!") then you'll be stressed out all the time. If you plan out the meetings weeks, months, or even a year in advance, you will be a much happier person and the program will run a lot better too. So, I suggest that you prepare a calendar for the entire year.
Start with the big items (monthly activities) and then build your monthly themes around them. For example, 12 monthly activities that I used once when I was teaching: What about the weekly activities? As discussed above, plan the weekly activities well in advance. This will keep you from getting surprised (for example when you show up to the church and the MiaMaid class is using the kitchen that you were hoping to use for your cooking activity). It will also allow you to ask the scout troop committee and the parents to drive or help out in other ways. By the way, you might find it easier to do all the teaching/practicing/applying during the meeting or the weekend activities - and all the "passing off" of requirements after the weekday meetings or on the overnight camps. Why? Because if the leader is taking time during the meeting to "pass off" something with a single young man, then the rest are generally either bored or wandering off somewhere (if only in their minds). It also makes the young man learn that he has to set up an appointment ("can you come see me in about 5 minutes after the meeting?") - something that is quite valuable when he has to find merit badge counselors a bit later in his scouting career. OK, the young men are advancing, now what? After advancements are earned, award them as soon as possible. After the activities are completed - review them and celebrate your successes! Have fun! Someone once told me "the goal is not for young men to get their Eagle, the goal is for them to become an Eagle Scout. Some young men get their Eagle badge, but never become an Eagle Scout, others become Eagle Scouts and never get the badge." (You're now saying, clearly this guy is off his rocker… but keep reading.) I believe that some young men "get their Eagle" because their Mom and Dad won't let them drive until they do, or maybe because their brother got his Eagle and they want to keep up with him, or perhaps it was just something that happened along the way. But some young men actually become Eagle Scouts because they have learned the leadership and service skills inherent in scouting, they have learned to teach and help others, they have put the principles inherent in the scout oath and law into their own lives. (By the way, a sign that a young man just "got his Eagle" is that he drops out of scouting soon after receiving the badge. A sign that a young man became an Eagle is that he stays with the program and is involved in helping others reach the Eagle rank. Get the picture?) So what does this mean to you? I suggest that you don't get hung up on the advancement program, just remember what you are really trying to teach (principles of scouting, leadership, etc.). Use the advancement program as one of several tools to teach the scouting principles, not as an end in and of itself. Don't worry, they'll advance on their own if you are running the program right. Teach the young men various options, then let them go through the process of choosing their option for their monthly activity. The planning and choosing as a group is as important, if not more important than learning the basic outdoor skills. For example, teach how to cook three or four different breakfasts at your weekday evening meetings, then have them decide together what they are going to cook at the campout, how to purchase all the ingredients, and assign (and remind) who is going to bring the pots and pans. They probably won't use the "cook up some oatmeal and hot chocolate over a campfire" skill much as they grow older - but they will use the "work together as a team," "help others feel good," and "delegation" types of skills almost every day as long as they live. But the real key is to have fun! Resolve now that you'll never have a boring meeting! You'll probably want to go through the Scout Handbook and come up with your own themes and ways to teach the basic scouting skills, but here is one way that I have done it when I have been asked to work with 11-year old scouts. I leave a lot of the "games" open on my schedule because we (the patrol leader and I) can either assign young men to come prepared to lead a game or because different groups of young men like different kinds of games, so it is hard to specify what will work for all young men. Theme: Citizenship Theme: Orienteering, Maps, Height/Width Theme: First Aid Theme: First Aid Theme: Knots and Lashings Theme: Knife and Ax Skills Theme: Fire Building, Using Stoves Theme: Camping Skills Theme: Hiking Skills Theme: Swimming Skills (definitely a summer activity unless you have an indoor pool)
Theme: Cooking and Menus Theme: Service in Scouting Ray Layton December 2004 |
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