WisconsinMomma
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Posts posted by WisconsinMomma
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Sorry about the misquote, I tried to find the original but was struggling. I don't think it's bad to seek out a hardworking spouse, but I think it's wrong to assume that the woman will be the cook, or that one spouse should pull more of the weight so the other can go play in the woods. There is a ton of sexism out there and it is something we need to be careful to avoid as Scouters.
I also think it's wrong to push our ideologies on Scouts. The Scout Oath and Law are the most important lessons. Live those, associate with people with similar values and that's not a bad way to live your life.
If you fail to see how mistreatment of women in other countries is a more barbaric example of some of the viewpoints of some old fashioned men in the US, well, then you're missing the connection. There are different flavors and presentations of sexism. Are we going to pretend there is no verbal abuse and domestic violence towards women the US? There is a lot of it. There is also a lot of child abuse in the US. Some of the attitudes about what women are responsible for and should be doing play into that violence.
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13 hours ago, Oldscout448 said:
As far as I am able to ascertain no one here has called for suttee, or dowery, or even the acceptance of sexist and demeaning jokes or stories.
It appears that one of the posts about criteria for choosing women who are rich and good cooks and seeing a woman working in a field and saying "that'll do" have been removed. I don't see those posts on this thread anymore, but they were here, and that's what prompted my replies.
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Hopefully by summer this outbreak will have run its course. The council in your area will need to see what the laws say about the issue for non school organizations.
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On 10/16/2018 at 8:38 AM, Eagle94-A1 said:
Not only do I have problems with the 6 year old being there, but the mother does not really care a fig about the Patrol Method. Regarding the 6 year old, he is left unsupervised, interferes with the patrol when stuff needs to get done, and when corrected by the PL or APL, yells "NO!" and continues doing stuff until a Scouter corrects him and tells him he needs to get back with his parents.
As mentioned the mom does not get the patrol method, despite being talked to about it multiple times. This is the mom who sees no problem with her son leaving the patrol campsite and hanging out with her and the family. This mom has no problem cooking food that her son will eat, and then allowing him to eat with his family.The mom doesn't see a problem with allowing her 12 year old son to sneak into the family tent on troop camp outs. This is the mom who got her husband and son to leave summer camp and sleep in a hotel one night, only having the husband call AFTER he was at the hotel. They knew reception at the camp is spotty, and it was sheer luck that one of the other adults got the text message stating dad and Scout were at the hotel and would be back in the morning. From my perspective, the mom doesn't understand Scouting, and only wants her son to be an Eagle.
She may be an enthusiastic CUB SCOUT leader, be she is problem as a BOY SCOUT, soon to be SCOUTS BSA, Scouter.
What information has the mom been given about the patrol method. Has she taken BSA boy scout level training? Has she been coached? Invite her to join the adults patrol then hang around your adults patrol campfire and start up the relationship. The 6 y.o. can hang with the adult patrol too. Or, find some other female leaders into your adult patrol so you have better coverage next time.
People don't just know the patrol method. They need information and coaching. Send her to Wood Badge!
It's hard to listen to the complaints that a) parents don't do anything, and b) parents do too much! Parents need to be taught their roles in the Troop too.
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My boys use Osprey Ace backpacks and my oldest uses a Marmot Neverwinter sleeping bag. We got one of the backpacks on Ebay and the sleeping bag off Craigslist.
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9 minutes ago, cocomax said:
Around here it is more of a Mom's club than a good old boys club, the Moms have been doing a great job of running off the good old boys.
I have no problems running off a good old boy who does not respect the current families in the Troop or is an egomaniac.
There is a reason why some people get nicer as they age, it's because they want to continue to be included and not sent off to the dust bin. A troop does not need a graybeard around to be successful. But if they happen to have a wonderful graybeard around, it's an asset. An elder who lives the Scout Law and is welcoming and kind to families is the kind of person you want around for a long time.
All adult leaders are replaceable. Our troop is cycling through this . Older leaders whose kids have long gone are leaving. That is OK! That is normal. New parents are stepping up to help run fund raisers and serve as merit badge counselors. That is all very healthy stuff.
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15 minutes ago, an_old_DC said:
Fixed that for you.
There is nothing about siblings in Scouts BSA
My oldest son has two brothers. They are siblings. They are all in Scouts BSA. Soon we may have older Scouts in troops with younger sisters in Cubs. That's Scouts BSA. We may have brothers in one troop and sisters in another troop. That's Scouts BSA. We may have Scouts with older siblings in Venturing. That's Scouts BSA.
And here's the thing, when you have Dad as a den leader and Mom running the popcorn sale, and sister in Venturing and Brother in Scouts, then that helps make a family stronger. And it helps make a community stronger.
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You know what's interesting is that we got new Scoutmasters this year (husband/wife team) and they have taken the training to heart. They are saying things like "you (Scouts) don't work for us, we work for you". They are moving the troop more towards Patrols than they have been in the past.
Every local flavor will be a little different, but it's not like there's no hope!
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I didn't say boys, I said good old boys, and you know what that means.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_ol'_boy
And I will add that any access to minors comes only with the permission of mom and dad, they are not the enemy. Scouting does belong to mom and dad and siblings, and we all have our roles and opportunities within the organization.
I have three children in Scouting and I absolutely have influence in our troop. I have more influence than older Scouters whose children grew up and left decades ago, because it is my family and my kids. Scouting exists today because of our membership. No kids, no program. I have a lot of influence as a current parent and Cub leader because I'm connected to Cubs, I can help Troops recruit cubs, I make introductions between our Arrow of Light den leader and Scoutmasters, I tell young boys (and a couple girls) that when they get older, maybe they'll be a Boy Scout, like that's the best thing ever. I help create opportunities for Troops to work with our Cubs, which helps give boys volunteer hours and lets young scouts see the upper level program. I have relationships with a lot of families with children because my family has children. Our Lions now, if we are doing things well, will be new Scouts six years from now. So I am thinking 10 years ahead, not 20 years behind. All of this is very valuable to Scouting. Now, is that bad? Because the organization cannot run on old Scouters alone. We have to work together and if you don't like working with families, you'll have no one to work with.
Here's an article about sexism in the middle east:
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1 minute ago, Eagledad said:
Welcome to family Scouting.
Barry
It's not the good old boy club anymore! And I"ve been in Scouting for 5 years, thank you very much.
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Here's the thing, it's not funny. My husband had a Chemistry professor who told him something like, "the taller they are, the more fun they are to ride." Is that a joke? Is it funny? Is it Chemistry? This is the kind of garbage that goes around and it's inappropriate.
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On 10/16/2018 at 10:55 AM, qwazse said:
It's like I have a long-lost brother!
When ever we visited home Mrs. Q helped prepare meals, Dad would come up to her and make sure she knew which cupboard had the garlic!
I do share these criteria to scouts of both sexes tongue-in-cheek, but also to help them think about core values.
Are they outdated and sexist? What, pray tell, should be a post-modern nomad's criteria for mate selection? Beauty? Personality? Desire? Wits?
Beauty vanishes, personalities change, desire waxes and wanes, wits dull, but ...
- If your spouse leans into the plow and secures wealth for your family and the poor in your community, you may hike and camp more and work double shifts less.
- If your spouse puts out a good meal, you may be presumed fed ... and freer to welcome the stranger to your table.
So, yes, I am having a little fun, but provoking thought at the same time.
2It might be a much more valuable and Scout-like lesson to talk to boys about what they should give in a relationship, more than what they can get. What makes a relationship a win-win for a husband and wife, and there's a lot more to it than he's the paycheck and she's the maid. If I heard that you were teaching my boys about your vision of spouse selection we'd be having a conversation where I'd be asking you to stick to the Scout Handbook. You are welcome to have that conversation with your own children all day long but it's not your scope of practice to train mine in that subject matter. I have some suggestions for my children about choosing a mate, but they are for my family only.
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21 hours ago, Oldscout448 said:
It does? Where?
Rural India and the Middle East are extremely sexist. In addition to this dowry burning, in parts of rural India women are expected to burn themselves to death, and celebrated for it, when their husbands die. All of this is treating women as property
20 hours ago, qwazse said:I do not know from any personal experience, but my understanding of mistresses and house-boys are that they are neither rich nor good cooks.
Speaking of "less developed countries" my father-in-law first noticed my mother-in-law while they were tending crops in the hinterlands of western PA. He saw her work-ethic and thought, "She'll do."
Demean the "help-mate" criteria all you want, but to this day, I am reaping the benefits of that union.
I think it serves everyone better to make sure the boys and girls can manage their own cooking and chores. I think demeaning the criteria is better than demeaning women.
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21 hours ago, qwazse said:
Beauty vanishes, personalities change, desire waxes and wanes, wits dull, but ...
- If your spouse leans into the plow and secures wealth for your family and the poor in your community, you may hike and camp more and work double shifts less.
- If your spouse puts out a good meal, you may be presumed fed ... and freer to welcome the stranger to your table.
So, yes, I am having a little fun, but provoking thought at the same time.
This sounds a little bit like how wives are chosen and treated in the backwoods of less developed countries -- a woman is chosen as a worker and treated like a slave / donkey, and the man goes and finds beauty and love and spreads his seed around with mistresses. Absolutely ridiculous.
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Right now I am shopping for Cubs, for the whole Pack, and it's all adult-driven so the online stuff is great. I am not sure why a Patrol could not have a meeting and go the online shopping together at their meeting, but this is a helpful service that's great at the Cub level.
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Just wanted to share that I'm using WalMart online grocery shopping for our Pack camping trip this weekend. Placed the whole order online and I will pick up the whole thing after lunch on Friday. Many grocery stores have online ordering and it saves a lot of time. It's also convenient to plan and order from home and calculate things like serving sizes and cost comparisons on the computer. If I ever am in charge of grocery shopping for the troop, I will teach the Scouts how to use this method.
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DeMarco is calling for reform so that no young person ever be allowed to ride along with officers alone.
"Ride-alongs should have either two officers and one explorer, or one officer and two explorers at all times," he said.
Yes.
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Bystanders are also important in helping prevention. The new YPT training helps with this a lot.
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Maybe I am over reacting, these are the worksheets our den leader is planning to use:
Here is one for cast iron chef:
https://meritbadge.org/wiki/images/a/a2/Cast_Iron_Chef.pdf
They are like the merit badge worksheets. What do you think?
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On 10/5/2018 at 10:17 AM, perdidochas said:
Scout leaders are volunteers. We can't be forced to follow the actions of the schools. While I agree with the idea of helping Scouts if I can, I would chafe at being told I have to follow an IEP as a volunteer.
We had an adult leader who nearly said -- I'm not doing jack for your kid, it's not my problem, and basically said no to every suggestion we made to try to help our kid. He ultimately decided that he would just not be around our kid at all because he didn't like our kid's challenges and was very critical of my son's (minor) behavior concerns. (Sounded great to us based on the attitude we were getting! Other leaders in the troop were easier to work with.) I understand that not every request can be made, but adult leaders should try to be kind and helpful as much as possible, especially when working with kids who have struggles.
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Back to this Scout and how things are going in the troop. @GSleaderSG is your son new to the troop? How old is he?
I'll share my son's early experiences in Scouting. My son has ADHD and social skills challenges. After his first summer camp, the committee chair called us and arranged a meeting to discuss our son not fitting in, and it felt like pressure on us to leave, except, we had no intention of leaving. Unfortunately our CC was not very sympathetic to working with a scout with special needs. That CC, who was overbearing himself, ultimately left Scouting. He suggested that my husband be on top of my son at all times, but my husband is an ASM and already attends every meeting and every outing and is there, but my husband was not going to nanny our son.
But, what we also did that I feel was important, was do some work on our side to help our son with his social skills issues. For us, that meant finding and working with a psychologist with a social skills group class for early teen boys. Our son attended this class weekly for 2.5 years and is now in individual counseling. I felt that helped a lot, and I think that growing up a little has helped our son a lot. He has learned strategies like slowing down and thinking, he learned breathing exercises, he learned how to visualize what might happen in the future based on what he's experienced in the past and he's learned how to notice people's facial expressions, tone of voice, and other social clues that can help him react more appropriately. They played games with challenges and had homework every week.
So if your son is young and new to the troop, I would not worry about a minor delay in advancement. But I would absolutely demand (courteously) that the bullying and teasing be stopped. That is as unacceptable as your son hitting someone. The troop adults cannot condone teasing and bullying.
The Boy Scouts cannot teach your son social skills, but they should provide a safe environment for him to learn in, and also they should partner with you to find some strategies that allow your son to do his best.
You need to work with the leadership to make sure they are not isolating and shunning your kid. Don't worry about advancement so much unless he is in danger of losing an opportunity to make Eagle by 18. If he is being purposefully held back, that's no good. But as you said, I think a break from advancement for violence is OK. Your son needs to restore relationships. You should ask your son about the positions and how the elections went and try not to be a helicopter parent.
If you have any tips or tricks that can help, then share that info with the Troop.
If you can get your son into counseling to help him manage his emotions and possibly work with a specialist on the speech too, that can help him a lot. There may be options at your school, or talk to other parents with kids with similar social skills concerns about if they have gotten help and who is good in your area. We drive a bit to get to a very good psychologist, (and pay out of pocket) and it's worth it. I think of it as an investment in our kid's future.
Best wishes.
P.S. Super-cool that your son is Bugler, our 10 year old might be a future Bugler too!
P.P.S. Volunteer for things and get involved with the committee. It's harder to kick out a boy whose parent is contributing. You also need to get to know as many adults in the Troop as you can, make some friends.
P.P.P.S. You need to suck up a little to the leaders and be kind to them too. Treat them like they are the experts in Scouting and helpful (unless they are particularly antagonistic) but they are your partners and team mates, so be very respectful and appreciative to the people working with your son. Be careful not to be the angry parent because it gets you nowhere.
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I learned that my son's den leader (Webelos) has decided to have the boys do worksheets this year (apparently they are online?) My son came home with a binder with some worksheets for personal fitness and stomped into the house and threw it down. Note that he gets overwhelmed when he's asked to do too many activities and he saw the work of logging fitness as a big drain on his time.
But at our committee meeting the den leader said, I found these worksheets and I think the boys are old enough to do them.
So now, I fear -- let's not have classroom style den meetings.
This is the den with rowdy kids and some parents who just. sit. there.
In other news, we have a kid who was rough at camp last year. The kid got sent home after he had ben in poison oak. Think of kid not behaving, running off into the weeds, and later feeling itchy. The night before he had a very hard time sleeping and being away from home. The parents have said they are not going to camp. (Mom posted on FB she was upset that their night with kid away was spoiled last year when it happened.)
Can we um, insist that a parent comes with the kid? He is actually a nice, decent kid when things are going well, but when he gets upset and out of control, its rough. Think of kid picking up and hurling logs around when he was frustrated. We had to make sure that no one got hurt and also that no other parent would rough up the kid in an attempt to gain control (a parent told me he was tempted to grab and discipline this kiddo, but thankfully he didn't, and that's not how things work).
Thanks for any help!
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21 hours ago, Eagle94-A1 said:
I already see packs making exceptions and changing requirements. Biggest one is the Whittling Chip requirements. It specifically states "Pocketknife," not "plastic cutlery knife" not "imitation wooden knife", and not "popsicle sticks." Irks me to no end that I need to redo Whitting Chip with my Webelos since they didn't really earn it and the previous DL thought they were "too dangerous"
On a side note, I am also culpable in changing the requirement. I had folks at day camp teaching Whittling Chip with wood carving knives from Paul's Supplies https://pauls-supplies.myshopify.com/collections/knives/products/carving-knife which is technically a fixed blade, not a pocket knife. But at least it was a real knife.
Wow, this is getting off topic, but we used plastic/popsicle sticks and soap and it puts a lot of peace of mind in a den leader working with multiple boys at once. It also lets the kids work a little faster for their first time carving. Now, soap is just for the first time.
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I think it's very important that issues be addressed on the FRONT end of the projects. So, encourage the scouts to think big.
At the same time, Eagle projects are not necessarily gigantic projects. One Scout builds 3 picnic tables. That's OK. Another Scout raises $10k to place a professionally made electronic sign in front of the fire department. Another scout gets a handful of guys to pull out invasive species weeds in a large park area for a work day of invasive species removal.
It's up to the adults to make sure that the project is meaty enough, and at the same time, make sure they are not forcing a scout to jump throrugh too many hoops to make him unsuccessful. I was recently frustrated when a person in our Troop delayed a Scout's project to build a gardening structure, because he wanted to make sure that the gardening structure would be used effectively by the beneficiary, but that was a large scope add, to bascially create the gardening club to support the structure. I think they ended up compromising, and the beneficiary is going to handle the future use, the Scout was planning and managing the construction. And that is OK.
You have to imagine it like it's your kid's project. Are they going to learn things? It has to be at the right level where they are learning but it doesn't have to be award-winning, just helpful to the community and meaningful for the beneficiary.
Contagious Disease Outbreaks
in Summer Camp
Posted · Edited by WisconsinMomma
It is the right of the citizen to decide whether to vaccinate their children or not.
In Scouting, this is going to be the decision of the camp owners (presumably the council) so most of us are not involved in these decisions anyway. Also, I'm sure there are laws related to how these issues should and should not be handled.
When we want to encourage participation in Scouting, it is not a great idea to take on a controversial issue such as vaxing or not vaxing. Why open the can of worms? Parents can and should decide their preferences. Why make it even harder for people to enjoy camp, when there have been no instances of issues at Scout camps? (that I know of, have there been?) Why operate on fear?
Are there nurses at camp? I am sure there are health officers, but the ABC forms are what we use.