Honor and Awards (pencil-whipped badges rant)

[OldGreyEagle 5]

Oh Beavah you made me drop arms with GoldWinger and I was right in the midst of a chorus

 

you posted

 

"FCFY and camps and such have probably exacerbated that problem by puttin' a time limit on things, and not givin' folks a sense that they should take as much time as necessary to learn."

 

Remember what Bob White posted on this subject:

 

"What people who talk about FCFY are usually refering to is First Class Emphasis. This is not an advancement program for youth either. It is a planning tool for adult leaders, to focus them on meetings and activities that teach, practice and apply the skills that scouts would need to learn to achieve First Class rank during a 12 to 14 month period.

 

 

The fact that there is a time frame does not mean it is rushed or that scouts should be advanced whether they have learned the skills or not. It just gives the leader an idea of how long it usually takes to be apble to learn, practice and apply these skills if you have an organized, and planned program."

 

So FCFY is about elements of a program that should be presented, it does not establish a time limit and should not be represented as much.

 

Whether it takes a scout 30 days to go from Scout to First Class or 6 years, they still have to meet the requirements and the BSA won't be there to sign the books, the Troop will have to manage that

[Bob White 20]

Hands on istruction is taught to leaders in multitude of Scouting training venues including Scoutmaster /Asst Scoutmaster leader Specific Training, Introduction to Outoor Skills, Roundtable, Wood Badge and other courses. It is done in a variety of ways including hands-on practice, keeping in mind that adults learn differently from youth.

 

 

[Gold Winger 9]

OGE, it looks like you're misunderstanding the misunderstanding.

 

"In what stages or courses of BSA adult leader training today are leaders taught "how to teach"?"

 

Despite BeeDub's hand waving answer, it really isn't. Skills may be taught but actual instructional methods don't get too much time.

[Kudu 186]

shortridge writes:

 

"In what stages or courses of BSA adult leader training today are leaders taught "how to teach"? And does this consist of hands-on instructional practice, or just standing up in front of a class with a flip chart and Sharpie?"

 

How to teach adults? A course called "Train the Trainer."

 

How to teach Scouts? Scoutmaster specific training replaces the Patrol Method with a Wood Badge manager theory in which the adults determine the "needs of the group" and apply the correct "adult leadership style" (for instance bypassing the Patrol Leaders and telling Scouts to put out the campfire with water).

 

In theory the "group" can progress to a stage where adult leaders don't do that "teaching," but there is no mention of that in Introduction to Outdoor Leader Skills (IOLS).

 

At this stage, manager theory has removed the teaching of skills to Scouts through hands-on PATROL Hikes planned by the PATROL Members in PATROL Meetings and led by the most talented and mature older Scout (the PATROL Leader), and gives it to the TROOP Guide and/or TROOP Instructors.

 

That way the Patrol Leader trained with manger theory can be totally incompetent for six months and his responsibilities split up into a bunch of other six month PORs. Dumbing down the Patrol Method provides an opportunity to teach more Scouts business manger skills that might come in handy some day at Enron or Lehman Brothers.

 

This "modern" version of the "Patrol Method" could be called the "Troop Method" or "Den Method."

 

Kudu

[shortridge 184]

I'm just thinking back to how my early leaders taught me basic skills, and comparing that to the instructional training I got on camp staff and at NCS. We reviewed the skills, practiced them ourselves, wrote out a lesson plan, rehearsed any necessary stand-up "lectures," practiced teaching the skill to our fellow staffers pretending to be Scouts and then got a critique.

 

I'm just curious if modern adult leader training gets that hands-on, or if the instructional skills are just theoretical.

 

Even experts in a field can't always teach it well.

[Kudu 186]

I once attended a national experimental version of the Train the Trainer course. This is the one where a gaggle of instructors wearing translucent yellow blouses waddled from table to table passing out colored construction paper, toy scissors, and edible paste as proud gold-looped BSA executives looked on from the sidelines.

 

I think we were supposed to make "Patrol Flags," but to be fair I missed the point of the toy scissors and edible paste session because I was inspired to pen an essay for my "Train The Trainer Course Evaluation Form" regarding the shame that the BSA executives should feel for dumbing Scouting down to the Cub Scout level.

 

Topics included:

 

Summary of Training Techniques

 

Rules for Discussion Leaders

 

Eight Requirements for Training Leaders

 

Trainer Characteristics

 

Objectives of Adult Training

 

How to Introduce a Speaker

 

How to Lead Games

 

How to Lead Songs

 

Making Power Point Presentations

 

Additional Power Point Notes

 

Reflection Summary

 

The Trainer's Creed

 

Train The Trainer Course Evaluation Form

 

See The Inquiry Net:

 

http://www.inquiry.net/adult/trainer/

[BadenP 93]

"Remember that adults learn differently than youth" - Bob White

 

Based on what Bob? Learning styles are the same for all human beings, there are visual learners, auditory learners, hands on learners, and all of us fall into one or more of these categories according to all the experts in the field of teaching and psychology. We tend to keep the same learning style all our lives, again according to the experts, so your premise is false to start with. The methodology of BSA training in many cases follows Kudu's example of treating adults like they were five years old. If you are teaching a teen how to tie knots for example you don't just show them once then hand them a piece of rope and tell them good luck, you make sure they have been able to accomplish task A before you move on to task B.

 

Train the Trainer is the perfect case in adult BSA training where if it is done right has a multifold beneficial effect, but if done wrong has an exponentially disasterous effect for producing incompetent trainers who in turn create incompetent leaders. I have to agree with Kudu after experiencing training at National and four councils that the program has been dumbed down over the years as well as the training. Now there have been those rare exceptions, WoodBadge (the older version) and Powderhorn, both of these provided great hands on experiences and lecture was kept down to the appropriate level to enhance rather than detract from the training. IMHO this is the way training for the BSA should be done for both youth and adults and would result in better trained leaders and youth who develop better outdoor and leadership skills, more excited about scouting, and striving to really EARN that Eagle.