Eagledad

>>Consider also just doin' a bunch of family campin', and skippin' Cub Scouts altogether. Have your son join Boy Scouts when he's ready, in an active troop.

Hi Randy I wrote this on another forum a few years ago for someone who was jumping strait from CM to SM. But I think much of it applies to everyone in your position. One other thing, relax and watch for at least six months. Relax and watch. This is a little long __________ Moving from Cubmaster to Scoutmaster Our troop has several past and present CMs as adult leaders. I also went from straight from CM to SM, but I was an ASM for three years while a CM, which made a big difference. I can honestly say a CM is a terrible Troop leader until trained. A CM usually leads boys in songs, skits, and cheers. That's the SPL's responsibility in the troop with the SM quietly looking on. A CM sets rules and enforces behavior. In a troop, the scouts do that with the SM teaching and guiding the scouts on their performance--always behind the scenes, not during the action. A CM needs to be outgoing and have the skills of an entertainer. A SM needs to appear introverted and lazy. The CM is responsible for some managing of the pack adult leaders, the SM tries to keep the adults busy, yet out the scouts' way. A CM gives badges to honor scouts. A SM gives responsibility to help scouts find their honor. A CM leads his boys on a hike so they have a wonderful experience. A SM follows scouts to allow them to find the wonder in their experience. I am not saying the CM role is any less important to the scouting program. On the contrary, like a student who learns to respect teachers for their education as they go out in society, scouts learn to respect adults for their wisdom as they move into the self independent troop program. Without that respect, a scout is less likely to seek guidance during his time in the troop. The SM needs to have a good knowledge of the troop program. He needs to understand how it offers boys what few other youth organizations do--courage of conviction. Each boy has dreams, and our goal is to motivate him to strive for his dreams, not force him to fit in ours. It is important to know how scouting makes a difference for a boy. Each one of us is born with a temperament that drives our emotions. It cannot be changed or taken away because it is part of us. We need that temperament or emotions to set us in action when we are hungry, confront danger or challenged. But without the character or logical part of us to balance our temperament, we might react with anger or fear instead of reason. We are not born with character, it is something we develop from life's experiences. Our personality (what others see in us) is the balance of character and temperament working together. As we grow into adults, we develop character by watching the behavior of people we respect, and by habits of behavior we develop in our environment. This is why a troop works so well, it provides a fun and adventurous environment that encourages scout to practice positive habits of behavior guided by the scout law. The challenging nature of the program sometimes pushes the scouts to struggle beyond their normal behavior where temperament overrides logical thinking and dominates their actions. Adults (and other scouts) are there to help the scout identify mistakes and guide him to learn better habits of behavior. This is how we reinforce character. If we protect our youth from struggles that show the ugly beast of over-reacting emotions, they never learn how to control themselves in those situations. Scouting is safe because we adults can monitor the boys when they are pushed to the limit. The job of the SM is to be ready to guide the change in the right direction. This is where a boy learns to be a man of character. Training is a must for Scoutmastering because it gets you in the right frame of mind and gives you some leadership habits for leading a Troop. Just like boys who may overreact to emotions in struggle, adults do the same in situations they are not prepared to deal with in the troop. Start reading. First get the Scoutmaster Handbook. Learn the three Aims and the eight Methods of Scouting. Remember that you are responsible for the Aims, the Scouts are responsible for the Methods. If you start to confuse that, you're likely to focus on the scouts destination, not their journey. The destination, which is the scouts goals and dreams are the scouts responsibility. The journey, which is the troop program is the SM's responsibility. That is why you don't see any objective goals in the Aims of Scouting. You must learn to understand how the methods get you to the aims. Get in the mind of the original SM by reading anything you can find on Baden-Powell and William Hillcourt. There's lots of stuff on the Internet. There is also an old publication called "Principles of Scoutmastership in Relation to Developing the boy" which is a great resource that combines the wisdom of Baden-Powell with the Aims and Methods of Scouting. Practice to understand how learning to tie knots in a duct tape society can make a better man of character. Learn how good followers make great leaders. Don't set goals for any scout because that makes him follow your visions, not his. Teach the boy to set his own goals so he finds himself as he pursues them. Don't build a bunch of you, guide them to find themselves. Build a quality program for the scouts journey so that their goals are challenging, but not impossible. Help them build habits that keep their temperament in check during struggle, and use their emotions for noble motivations. Be humble in your leadership. A CM stands proudly with his scouts, a SM is the shadow behind his young men standing proud of their accomplishments. Your rewards are not immediate, but come when you least expect them. Your stature will give you instant respect, but your relationship with the scouts will build lasting memories. You will have many opportunities with youth in your community as a coach, teacher, or cheering spectator. Scoutmastering is all of that, and more. You have just been given the opportunity to build men of character and leaders of integrity. You are the Master Scout. If all goes well, the scouts will go home saying "I like myself when I'm with the Troop". I love this Scouting Stuff. Barry

Well, Im not a Venture or Ship leader and I dont play one on TV. Ship Leader? Is that right? Anyway I have two friends who are Venture Crew leaders and I have to say that their experience is almost identical to yours Eamonn. The girls kind of run the crews and seem a little offended by any boy who has a scouting experience and attempts to use his skills. My friends are also a little disappointed with the lack of skills that his Boy Scouts should know but dont. They also are unsure of where they personally should push and where to let things just coast. Their meetings are OK, but most of the enthusiasm comes more from the female side of the groups. Two thirds of the membership is girls in both crews. Your part about the girl telling the boy how she enjoyed peeing outside only reminds me how raising my 16 year old daughter is much much much much harder than raising my two sons. I must say that everyday with my daughter makes me feel like I know nothing as a parent and Im starting over. After working with hundreds of teenage boys, it just doesnt seem fair. I have a couple of questions: What is your personal vision for your ship and if what do you think would happen at a meeting if the adult leaders didnt show up? I love this scouting stuff. Barry

I'm of a little different mind here. No matter how good or how organized a pack can be, there is always a parent or two around who would do it better. You guys had a vision of what should have happened and I'm not sure that any pack could have lived up to that expectation. I'm not defending the pack program, but just suggesting that you give this pack a chance for a couple months to learn how they really work. You could be just the adults they need, or it could be that they really do know their stuff and just didn't put a lot into this one outting. Watch this pack a little while and then ask to help out. Maybe your family is the one piece that pack needs to complete their puzzle. Maybe there is a method to thier maddness, who knows. Hang out long enough to find out. Welcome to the forum and to scouting. I really look forward to reading more of you post. Scouting is and should be a wonderful experience. Barry

After being a Webelos leader for two Dens and a SM, my opinion is between three to five overnight outings over the two years as Webelos. Any more than that and I found that they are actually a little bored on their first couple of Troop campouts. I actually had one Webelos Den join our troop that had camped every month as Webelos. They were better at scout skills than most second year Boy Scouts. We lost all those scouts by summer camp because they never felt like they could fit in. No wonder, they had kind of become their own troop as Webelos. I like to tell Webelos leaders that they need to take their scouts on enough campouts to where they can sleep in a tent without mom or dad. They dont need to be experts at cooking out, just comfortable with the idea. Barry

Not trying to change the subject, but now that you have been doing this older scout thing for a while, what are your opinions of the troop programs? Not just games, but the meetings and their agendas as well. How are the girls doing also? Just curious. Thanks Barry

Im not sure the tree thing is a good example, but I like it. FB is right that fear could be the motivator of some actions. Ive had a couple instances with new scouts who didnt even get to the tree because they were afraid of the dark. Yes, they had to wash the tent. Not out of punishment, but for hygiene. Our SPLs solution was for the new scouts to get the older scout in the next tent to guide them until they were more confident. Or, at least get to the tree. I guess one persons environmentalism is another person's small step toward developing courage. One thing Ive learned about adults is we all have different ideas toward managing behavior. In the big picture, our job is guiding boys to develop habits of making the right decisions. The motivations we use should never in anyway mentally or physically harm these boys. But in a world where some believe that singing happy birthday can be a form of hazing, well our choices are getting limited. I once had a tent full of very excited new scouts keeping the whole troop up on our first night of summer camp. The SPL was frustrated after several attempts to quiet them and asked for my help. I guess there were several approaches that could have been taken, but I really didnt want to get down on these guys. They were after all just excited about the whole experience and who could blame for being boys. And I really didnt want the SPL to see that getting down on these guys was the only way to control such behavior. I choose to take the boys on an evening hike. No yelling, no lecture, no threatening, just put on your shoes and lets go for a 20 minute hike. So we hiked around camp stopping every few minutes to identify stars and talk about this and that. We gave a couple of minutes to being courteous and kind to the other folks in camp and we left it at that. It was pretty much a pleasant evening hike in the Colorado Mountains and the rest of the week went fine. The scouts were back in bed by 11:30 and the rest of the troop had a nice sleep. I once passed this along on a forum and one adult replied that I acted inappropriatly because the hike bordered on physical punishment. He followed with his solution of just threatening to send them home. There you go: two different approaches to solving one problem. And each one thinking the others approach inappropriate for the situation. Pushups now seem kind of an easy answer to me, hmmm. Barry

HI all What a great subject and everyone has great suggestions. I would kike to add that our troop never plans a campout for Webelos. Instead we plan a Troop campout and if the Webelos plan to come, we then have the Troop Guide ASPL and ASM make the agenda work for the Webelos. We've do this for a couple of reasons. One we want the Webelos to experience a typical Troop Campout. The other is we don't want to plan a campout around Webelos and then have none show up. We have had years were Webelos visited on three campouts in a row. We have had a Den leader call only a week a head of time trying to fit a visit in. All that being said, we had Webelos on our Shot Gun Campout, mountain biking campout, Rapelling campoout, and a Troop Camporee campout where the scouts had to hike, bike and canoe to 15 different scouts skills stations. We make modifications where they have to made like Webelos can't rapel, so they did boulder hopping. We had Boys Scouts in the canoes and we give help where skills such as navigation was required. Typically Webelos are so tired on Sundays, they can barely cook breakfast. But what I think they enjoyed the most was being included and treated as part of the troop, not as visitors. I remember one Webelos parent asking if all our campouts were as action packed as the they were on. I told them they are all different, but typically everyone is a sleep by 10:00 Saturday Night. I remember a Biking campout where the Webelos where riding near the egde of the lake. One parent asked if I would go tell them to get away in case they fell in. I said if they fall in, they will learn that it was a stupid idea. As luck would go, it was that parent's kid who fell in. He didn't say anything the rest of the day, but I knew he was mad. A week later that dad called me and said he was trying to convience the whole Den to join our troop. He said his son went home and told his friends how stupid he was for riding so close to the very cold lake. He would not do that again. After that, the dad was convience the boy run thing worked. Dad and I became very good friends after that. I do think doing and activity badge is a great idea and can also be done as just a Saturday morning or afternoon as well. Also, don't discount Webelos just visiting a campout. Once in a while we get a den that has something going on but would love to spend a Saturday on the campout with the troop. In every case those Webelos joined our Troop. I am really enjoy each idea presented here. Hope we get more. Barry

Great post Eamonn, but I have a couple side questions; >>We have several Eagle Scouts in the Ship who couldn't plan a trip to the bathroom without some help.

Hi Goodkidsmom Our troop has done a few of these, and I will say the scouts seem to like them the most because they are bit more relaxed with the speakers doing shorter presentations, and there are a lot of friends and family attending. Funny enough, our scouts designed our first multiple ECOH and they used a simplistic approach. So start off from what you think a single would be like then modify it. >>So, my questions are, what are the logistics?> Do we go through everything for one boy at a time, then hit the punch and cookies?>What is shared and what is individual?>Do they both stand up there the whole time?> Do we send out two invitations or one?>Does anyone know of some programs or scripts for shared ECoHs>Or is the whole idea a bad one???

>>Unfortunately, these scouts are now tied up in sports and not actively involved for a few months.

I'm with jr56 on this. To be honest, I can't imagine that a 13 year old could plan a very complex trip, especially if they don't have much experience at it. So Im sure that to them it looks as monumental as a mouse eating an elephant. Does you PLC plan the monthly trips? Here is what I would do if I were you. Spend the next six months training them on planning. Start off small and have them first plan an evening trip to the movies, then an overnight trip at a local park. Then a weekend high adventure trip like backpacking or what ever. Make each trip something unusual and sounds cool. Let them know that is what is going on, then tell them that the SM is letting your group go to the movies at the next meeting. But, they have to plan the trip or it is a no go. Then you start the training. Give them basics of planning and a menu that they can follow for every trip. Something like this: Destination information like fees and times. Times and dates. Scouts and scouters attending. Transportation required and Route. Required documents for trip. Equipment required for trip. You get the idea. Start with the easy trip, and gradually make it more complex so that the scouts can see how to plan the trip. As they get practice, I think they will get better following the plan and gaining confidence. Also, give them deadlines and hold them to them. Dont wait until the deadline to ask if they are ready, they likely at first wont. Give them time to save face. I used to do something like this: Hi SPL, Im just calling to find out how that plan for the next weeks PLC meeting is going. Oh you still arent finished. Thats OK, just give me a hint. Oh, I see. OK, is it alright that I call tomorrow then?. They never say no and usually they have something to offer. Our adult for the Troop news letter is very smooth with this method of getting his scouts to meet deadlines. I almost feel guilty. Its not that our kids are lazy today, its that we dont really give them that much practice at building a discipline for meeting timelines. You just need to remind them that others are counting on them and give them a little room to save themselves. Their guilt will motivate the rest. A few of our scouts got so good at planning that they got mad if adults offered to help. But it took a few years to get our troop to this level of confidence and independence. But you have to understand their maturity and experience level of the task to know where you help or stand back. Hope this helps. Barry

>>I hope that homophobes will eventually realize that their fears are in vain and their hate is unscoutlike.

I believe that we lead our lives by dodging our fears. In fact I usually tell leaders that adult fears are the limitations of boy run troops. Usually the more boy run, the more the adults have trained their scouts past their adult fears. Naturally Boys usually learn the limits of their fears by their natural drive of pushing themselves in physical actvities. Whether it is using tools, going as high as we can and then coming down as fast as we can, jumping in to test the waters and pushing ourselves to go as fast as we can, we boys are driven to it by instinct. Women on the other hand have a different drive to jugde before they leap. Their caution is derived from the instinct protect their young until they reach a maturity to compete in the world. The balance between the two is letting the boys go far enough to learn the skills to succeed, but not so far as to get permantly injured. Thus the constant struggle between mom and dad, or male leader and female leaders. We are talking about horseplay and such things here, but I see this in our discussion of woods tools and power tools. Scouting is a wonderful place to learn the limitations and safety of power tools, yet it gets a lot of cold water thrown on the idea because of the fear. One other observation that hasn't been thrown out, I know parents worry about the older scouts, but I found in manny cases that older scouts or Troop Guides get hurt a lot. First they would be the cool Older Scout by horse playing with one or two new scouts, but it wouldn't take long before all the new scouts are jumping in the act and the one older scout is pleading for his life. Barry

Yes, I understand. I used to be the Council JLT Chairman and most of the people I communicated with from the National all the way down to troop level use JLT generically for youth leadership training or developement. We used "Troop or unit JLT" as the term for unit level training. National issueing their TLT course seems to have muddled the water a lot. I know of a lot of troops that called their unit level training TLT long before National called did. And the TLT they used is not the TLT or JLT you are refering to. In fact, many of the unit's courses I've seen came from scaled down Brownsea or JLTC courses. Thanks for the explination. Have a great day. Barry

>>But those of you who have taught TLT (and I have) will spot the problem here: 95% of the course isn't position-specific.

>>I see no problem with a Troop having the expectation that the boys will go to training because it is the right thing to do. But if the leaders do not sign off on the requirement and deny them their Star rank (or other rank) because they did not attend a non-mandatory training session then that is wrong.

>>You need to talk to the CC or Advancement Chair about your concerns, so that they can have a conversation with the SM if they think it's appropriate. Or you can have an informal conversation with the SM if you have a good friendly working relationship.

>>I commend the SM for wanting to have the boys all trained but I can't imagine making a boy sit through Troop Guide training every six months for as longs as the boy is a Troop Guide.

>>However the Pack Committee sees nothing wrong with the CMs actions.

>>You're either religious and a Republican or you are not religious? Where did that come from?

OK, do I understand right, you are considering taking the course that you have already staffed because the course may not make? This is a new one on me, but I can't help feel the time would be better spent helping a struggling unit or district committee. I'm really courious to read Eamonn's (WB guru) opinion on this. How would the CD pick a patrol for a person with your experience? Barry

>>Hi! I'm a religious person on the left. And there are a lot more of us. We just don't tend to wear it on our sleeve.

>>The few times that gay marriage "won" was when it was legislated from the bench -- one wonders how exactly *that* is supposed to square with hearing from both sides?

At one time we took a count and found that four of our families had three brothers in our troop, and eight other families with at least two. I could never bring myself to ask these families to buy more than one subscription of Boy's Life. Barry