Den Chiefs & Party
Barb Stephens (bsteph@BLUEJAY.CREIGHTON.EDU)
Wed, 20 Apr 1994 08:58:53 -0500
About a month ago, I put out a request about asking Boy Scouts to help out
with Cub Scout den activities and I received many helpful and informative
replies. I spoke with the Boy Scouts Scoutmaster who was willing to
cooperate. As it turned out, the day I wanted help was during a scheduled
campout. So, I asked a couple parents to help and they did so willingly.
Our den meeting was a party where we celebrated the birthday of every boy.
We planned an obstacle course, a scavenger hunt, the hammer-the-nails
relay (from the games on this list), and the Iron Man relay (also from the
games list). Beforehand, my husband and I designed and built the obstacle
course: a cardboard tunnel (Z-shaped), balance walk on a landscape timber
that is the edge of a large sandbox, carry a small brick a distance &
back, throw a softball in the air & catch it, hop/walk through a
zig-zagged rope 6inches off the ground (like football players "running"
through tires placed on the ground), climb & slide down a "little tikes"
slide, run/jump through a jumproped turned by two adults, carry a cupful
of water to a flowerbed and water a dry flower, ride a "little tikes"
garden tractor up and down a patio wearing a bicyle safety helmet, and
finally, hitting a croquet ball through two wires.
The boys helped decorate when they arrived, and played ring toss and bean
bag toss (we made these at earlier meetings) until everyone had arrived.
After the regular den meeting opening, we started right in on the
obstacle course. One volunteer walked the boys through the course, and
we stressed that this was not a race and they should go at their own
pace. The boys loved the course so much that they went through at least
three times straight. Now this may not sound too challenging, but some
of my Wolfs are about 70 pounds, some are barely 50, so the slide &
tractor were too small for the bigger boys, while the smaller boys had a
workout carrying the brick. It seemes like all the boys had trouble
judging when to take off through the turning jumprope (I remember jumping
rope all the time in lower elementary - is that a "girl" thing?) It was a
lot of fun.
The scavenger hunt involved some imagination and some common sense. They
had to find a twig in the shape of an uppercase letter (most found a Y),
and find a spherical rock (had to know what spherical was), and they also
had to find a pinecone (had to know where pinecones would occur naturally).
The nail hammering relay at first seemed like it would take forever, but
the boys persevered and actually got better with time. The Iron Man
relay (modified a bit) proved to be too many different activities to
remember even with an adult "coaching" each scout. The others left in
line were too often bored. But, overall they had a great time. We
finished with ice cream cones and individual cupcakes and a present (a $2
8oz hammer & a yo-yo). The hammers can be used for future den projects.
The Cub Scoutmaster (a parent of one Wolf) was there and said he would
help organize getting Boy Scouts to serve as Den chiefs in the future.
He liked the obstacle course so much that we are going to reconstruct
some of it at our upcoming Pack meeting whose theme is "Shape Up".
Thanks to everyone who gave advice and thanks to the list group as a
whole for all the good ideas I have picked up!
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Barb Stephens bsteph@creighton.edu
Acad Computing
Creighton University 402 280-2263
Omaha, NE 68178-0044 402 280-2573 (fax)
Terry Howerton Sakima Group, Inc. SCOUTER Magazine Kansas City |
