Adult Association Method

[Eagledad 2779]

I was taught that a mentor is passive and that the mentee approaches the mentor for clarity. Leadership is aggressive and that leaders approach the team members to provide clarity. That helped me when I was guiding adults of their roles with the scouts.

 

Barry

[Stosh 3452]

  We're close.  Your understanding of mentor/mentee is not precisely dictionary in nature.  I kinda think of it as buddies doing the Double-Dog Dare challenges of pushing each other.

 

A lot of times the boys in the troop end up being quite close friends once they reach adulthood.  I just push that adulthood thing earlier in life and we just start out friends.  I can honestly say no youth in any of the groups I have led/chaperoned/etc. has ever asked, "When are you going to start treating me like an adult?"  I have had other adult leaders tell me I shouldn't be treating them like adults, they're children after all!   I had a whole group of adults have me removed as SM because the boys were expected to do too much leadership.  The really sad part of it all was they were doing a fantastic job at it.

[MattR 2659]

Maybe what would help the adults the most would be to spend less time putting labels on it and more time explaining it.

 

Leadership is primarily learned by doing it.

 

A scout can't possibly lead while an adult is talking to him, much less telling him what to do. Even just being there will have an impact.

 

Adults do have good experience to share with scouts that can help them learn, it's just best shared before or after the scout needs to use it.

 

That all said, the biggest challenge I see is getting a scout to confront a problem with other scouts that are about the same age. Maybe this is where the young scouts are most useful, the older scouts are easily annoyed with the younger scouts and have to take control for their own sanity. But dealing with scouts their own age seems to be a big challenge. Once they're over that hump they take off.

[Stosh 3452]

Maybe what would help the adults the most would be to spend less time putting labels on it and more time explaining it.

 

Leadership is primarily learned by doing it.

 

Totally agree, that's why I don't place a lot of merit on classes that think they are teaching leadership.

 

A scout can't possibly lead while an adult is talking to him, much less telling him what to do. Even just being there will have an impact.

 

Again agree.  This is where we as adults often screw things up.

 

Adults do have good experience to share with scouts that can help them learn, it's just best shared before or after the scout needs to use it.

 

Best before, okay afterwards in a private setting to help the boy when things didn't go just right.

 

That all said, the biggest challenge I see is getting a scout to confront a problem with other scouts that are about the same age. Maybe this is where the young scouts are most useful, the older scouts are easily annoyed with the younger scouts and have to take control for their own sanity. But dealing with scouts their own age seems to be a big challenge. Once they're over that hump they take off.

 

Boys at this age are looking to figure out pecking order in the group.  Big boys go to the top and run roughshod and the newbies take a back seat.  It seems to follow the seniority business model.  Boys don't know what to do with peers because they don't always fit well into this pecking order.  Bullying might help the stronger boys, and survival of the fittest always seem to play themselves out, sometimes tacitly, sometimes physically.

 

I always use the Servant Leadership model with the boys because it isn't always obvious to boys of this age how it works at first and when they do understand, they seem to be quite comfortable with it.  When one is playing the pecking order game and then find out that that's not the game, it can be a real eye-opener for them.

 

Interestingly enough, the adults can fit into the process quite easily and after enough trust is built up in the relationships, the adult interference of leadership will go away rather quickly.  At least that's been my experience, your mileage may vary.

[Eagledad 2779]

 

 

Boys at this age are looking to figure out pecking order in the group.  Big boys go to the top and run roughshod and the newbies take a back seat.  It seems to follow the seniority business model.  Boys don't know what to do with peers because they don't always fit well into this pecking order.  

 

This analogy runs counter to the "take care of your boys" motto because age isn't a factor in being a servant. We also have a "take care of your boy" type program, although we call in servant lifestyle, and we have the opposite results with our older scouts. Our older and senior scouts not only take an interest of a young scouts present experience in the troop, but they also take interest in helping the younger scouts prepare for their future experiences like leadership. The PLC often takes time recognizing younger scouts for their growth in maturity by asking them to take on advanced positions of responsibility. That is exactly what I expect from a take care of you boys program from beginning to end. As a result, our PLC is very mixed aged.

 

And maybe the reason we have different results is because we do call the troop a servant lifestyle. Servant leadership is only one aspect of the lifestyle. Being a servant is a full time responsibility.

 

I'm not talking about the comments here, but I must say I'm surprised that some adults assume attitudes of serving will change with maturity. I hear it a lot, "older scouts don't like to babysit young scouts". The troops I observed with older scouts that have attitudes of superiority got the attitude from their adults. 

 

As for scouts of the same age not taking charge, it's human natural to shy away from conflict, especially with your friends. The way we got through this was guiding the scouts to work as a team for being responsible to each others behavior. They understood the concept better when they found the whole team being held equally responsible for one members misbehavior that the team could have prevented. When the whole group is held accountable to one persons bad behavior, the risk of conflict is diminished a lot because the group is appreciative and supportive of actions to change the behavior. 

 

There was a humorous result of that team accountability concept; one of the methods our scouts used to deal with misbehavior is asking the misbehaving scout to leave and wait outside the room or area until after the activity or meeting. Sometimes the scouts are instructed to find the SPL or SM for conference about their behavior. Kind of a last straw thing, but I was always blown away when a scout walked up and asked for a conference because their PL sent them. It seems the scouts bought into the team accountabiliity so well that most are willing to accept consequences of their own misbehavior as part of the process. I can honesty say I never saw that coming. LOL

 

Barry

Edited January 21, 2016 by Eagledad

[Stosh 3452]

One of the dynamics of adult association mentioned is this idea of punishment.  We've discussed it in other threads here on the forum, but not in the context of adult association.

 

Okay, one of the boys screws up.  (Like that never happens.  ) 

 

My boys are expected to take care of it themselves.  It's part of taking care of the boys "leadership lesson".  In all the years of scouting (church and community youth groups as well) I have only once had to play the "principle's office" role as an adult.  I didn't do very well at it.  I basically didn't do anything at all.  The only time I had to deal with it was when I was on the Centennial Jamboree staff and two of the boys were caught stealing.  They weren't my boys, the youth leadership in general was pretty much useless and the contingent had devolved into pretty much adult-run.  I was the only one on-site when the culprits were hauled before me the sole magistrate by their PL.  I called over the SPL and sat him down there with me. I just waited.  Got a lot of whittling done, lots of silence.  Eventually the SPL with the PL's help dealt with the situation.  I sure wish he hadn't taken such a long time to get started but once they realized who was going to have to  do it, they stepped up and took over, it worked out nicely.  It was decided the boys were to make restitution, apologies made to those involved, including their patrol buddies, and they would notify their SM of the situation and the SPL would follow up with the SM once everyone got home.  All I had to do was facilitate an opportunity for boys to lead.  The only thing I said to the SPL and PL after it was all over was, "Well done, gentlemen." and went back to my tent. 

 

Too often we underestimate the potential of our youth because we think the boys are still children that need to be instructed.  I trust them to be the adults they told me they wanted to be.  It's worked for me, your mileage may vary.

 

Never take away an opportunity for a scout to lead.  Two scouts learned a lesson, the consequences would reflect back to their home SM.  The SPL did a fantastic job of sorting it all out.  I'm sure they found a lesson in there as well. 

[Eagledad 2779]

I wasn't talking about punishment, that is a whole different discussion. 

 

Barry

[Stosh 3452]

I doubt the PL would send a boy out of the meeting to discuss their exemplary behavior with the SPL or SM.  Maybe they would, but I've never run into that.

Edited January 21, 2016 by Stosh

[Eagledad 2779]

I doubt the PL would send a boy out of the meeting to discuss their exemplary behavior with the SPL or SM.  Maybe they would, but I've never run into that.

Different approaches to this scouting stuff stosh.

 

Barry

[MattR 2659]

I'm not talking about the comments here, but I must say I'm surprised that some adults assume attitudes of serving will change with maturity. I hear it a lot, "older scouts don't like to babysit young scouts". The troops I observed with older scouts that have attitudes of superiority got the attitude from their adults. 

 

As for scouts of the same age not taking charge, it's human natural to shy away from conflict, especially with your friends. The way we got through this was guiding the scouts to work as a team for being responsible to each others behavior. They understood the concept better when they found the whole team being held equally responsible for one members misbehavior that the team could have prevented. When the whole group is held accountable to one persons bad behavior, the risk of conflict is diminished a lot because the group is appreciative and supportive of actions to change the behavior.

Regarding babysitting, I've seen different sources. One is the parents taking care of the younger scouts, so the older scouts never had to. When they finally did they didn't know how. We used to have that problem. Second is, after 3 years of not taking care of anyone but yourself, the older scouts that are selfish at home figure that's the way to do it. I take to heart everyone's comments that taking care of other people has to start right away. I don't push that hard enough.

 

Regarding not taking charge, interesting idea, that might just play out in a case I have. I have a patrol that last summer could only be described as dysfunctional. It's much better now because I think they realize I don't want to get involved and nobody else wants their issues. Come to think of it, there were two patrols that could easily describe, both of which are in much better shape. Anyway, the PL which they picked is the best choice but, as you said, doesn't want to rock the boat. Two of the other scouts love to rock the boat. It's interesting because I know they still have some issues but they didn't want to admit it. I figure there's some pride involved, so I challenged them to host a den of webelos next week. I told them how important this is for the troop and no adults would be there. That pumped up their egos a bit, as well as their fear. This seems good. They decided to meet this weekend to get ready.

[TAHAWK 1420]

All the parts of the Patrol Method as set out for Scouting in the U.S., primarily by Bill, are still found in B.S.A. literature and website statements.   I have quoted the words repeatedly here, as have others. (Example:  "nless the patrol method is in operation, you don’t really have a Boy Scout troop.")

 

Unfortunately, those in charge of B.S.A. behave as if they are either unfamiliar with the material or no longer find it to be important to B.S.A.'s operational goal.

[Eagledad 2779]

Regarding babysitting, I've seen different sources. One is the parents taking care of the younger scouts, so the older scouts never had to. When they finally did they didn't know how. We used to have that problem. Second is, after 3 years of not taking care of anyone but yourself, the older scouts that are selfish at home figure that's the way to do it. I take to heart everyone's comments that taking care of other people has to start right away. I don't push that hard enough.

 

 

This makes sense to me.

 

What I have noticed about some troops with the older scout issues is that the program hasn't really matured beyond a first class program. In other words the program repeats itself over and over so that young scouts are always advancing with the older scouts always teaching. The problem isn't that older scouts are tired of working with young scouts, rather they are bored from repeating the same old program over and over. They only resent the younger scouts because they appear to be the cause for doing same activities that they have been doing for two or three years since they were new scouts. Even the adults who have been there two and three years are bored and that is where the notion of baby sitting comes from. The adults are bored and it doesn't take much for the bored older scouts to start repleting the babysitting stuff. This is main reason why Venturing Crew are created, which typically fail inside three years.

 

I try to guide the adults of these programs to expand their 'Troop"program out to doing more outdoor adventures with less drive toward getting advancement credit from the experience. Just take the troop on a weekend back packing trip, or fishing, or biking. Give the scouts something new and different to experience. This gives the older scouts more patrol method leading and less teaching. And, try to create outings where advancement credits are a result of the activities in the theme of the outing, and not the theme itself. Then the older scouts are teaching skills for the theme of the activity, not for First Class advancement itself. It's a lot more fun to learn knots for a rappelling weekend. The older scouts and even adults will have a much more rewarding scouting experience in that kind of program. Then who needs to create a whole new program for high adventure. 

 

Barry

[Stosh 3452]

@@MattR

 

I start from day one.  Tenderfoot Requirement #9 - Buddy system, it's more than just a swim partner and someone to hold your hand when you go to the latrine.  Even BSA has added the bully component.  This should be taught in the Wolf den.  The Buddy System is taking care of someone besides yourself!  My orientation to the new Webelos always emphasizes Scouting isn't just for you.  It's not your Eagle, if one doesn't see themselves as part of a community, then the citizenship, the leadership, and character building is all for naught.  We have enough narcissistic Eagles with the routine we've been running.   Self focused scouts don't last very long.  The other scouts get tired of carrying their dead weight and will address it as time passes.  Either they shape up or ship out.  It's their call.

[Eagledad 2779]

Our guys don't hold hands when they go to the latrine. 

[Stosh 3452]

Our guys don't hold hands when they go to the latrine. 

How do you know, you're not supposed to be in there when they are. 

 

By the way, do any of you guys out there know why women always need to use public restrooms in pairs?  They can't all be former Girl Scouts.

Edited January 21, 2016 by Stosh