26/06/14
We started off this evening by decorating stars for the Big Brownie Birthday Fun Day in 2 weeks. There were two stars for the girls to decorate: one they will keep and stick a sticker on it at each station on the day and the other which will be given to a randomly selected girl from another unit. They had to write their name on both of them and then what they enjoy most about Brownies on the one that's being given away. They could then draw whatever they wanted on the back of both of them. I was talking to our Guide when there was a bit of commotion from one of the tables. It was only friendly banter but they all kept yelling "I'm gonna tell" so I decided to sit with them to try and calm things down a bit. Colouring the stars kept the girls busy for most of the evening and, after almost an hour, they had all finished and we started tidying up as our Guide was supervising the two hostesses for the Promise ceremony make tea and coffee for the parents of the girls making their Promise tonight.
As I was helping sweep paper off the table, Brown Owl came over and said that she'd realised that she'd lost a Promise badge somewhere between home and the hall. She asked me if I'd pop home and grab another one for her. Our house is only a 5 minute drive away so I hopped in the car and nipped home. While I was gone, the girls sang a couple of songs to fill the time and entertain the parents. I believe they sang 'Have you ever seen a penguin come to tea?', 'Thunderation' and 'Cuddly Koalas' (lyrics here). When I got back, we started the Promise ceremony. We had two girls making their Promise this evening. They both did really well - one needed prompting but other than that it all went smoothly.
After the Promise ceremony it was time to hand out loads of badges - quite a lot of first, second and third year badges, some Adventure Ons, the two hostesses and two cooks to a girl who'd done them in her own time! Even with the interlude where I went to get the badge we still managed to finish exactly on time! All that was left then was to supervise the two hostesses washing up. We thought we were going to have to take the badge off the first girl ever as we saw her walking across the car park with her mum before doing her part of the washing up but then it turned out she was just taking her things to the car and then coming back! She came back and did her bit and then we could all go home.
It was quite a relaxed evening as all I had to do was sit with some girls and talk to them.
In other news, I've started seriously looking at my Look Wider qualification, now that I've finished my exams. I have done a fair few of the phases already (mostly phase 3s - YL, ALQ, driving test) but I haven't yet completed a whole octant, although I'm quite close. Now I just have some writing up to do and then I have to decide what to do to fill the blanks.
Monday 30 June 2014
Monday 23 June 2014
The Long Awaited Walk!
19/06/14
This week we took the girls up the local hill, as we had planned to do when we couldn't use the hall because of voting. When we told them last time that it had been cancelled, many of them were upset and several asked us when we were going to do it instead so we slotted it in to this week.
We had a minor crisis just before as two of our leaders couldn't come due to family circumstances and that put us below the required ratio. Brown Owl put out a quick email to the parents asking if anyone would mind staying and a few said they would join us so we were covered once again! We knew that a few of the girls have dogs and their parents were planning on using the opportunity to walk the dog while we were up there so we knew it wouldn't be too much of a problem, it was just a case of letting them know. We ended up having 4/5 join us in the end!
We met the girls by the visitor centre at the top of the hill and checked everyone off on the register. When everyone had arrived, we had a brief discussion as to which way we were going to go; there were three choices from where we were at that point! There was quite a lot of shouting and pointing until we finally settled on heading into the woods. We set off with the Leaders and parents interspersed with the girls and the express instruction that everyone must stay within sight and not go through any gates without the rest of the group. At each junction in the path we pretty much left it up to the girls at the front as to which way we were going to go, except towards the beginning where the path they chose was back towards the visitor centre already! Quite a few of the girls picked up sticks to use as walking sticks and there were a few that were being carried by two or three girls that were pretty large. We're still not quite sure why they were carrying them - no one could get a straight answer out of the girls - but we let them carry on unless it was being waved around too much and in danger of hitting other girls/leaders.
We came a cross a couple of members of the public who looked at us as if we were slightly mad to be taking so many girls for a walk and then deliberately chose the path we didn't because we were making quite a bit of noise too! Our walk took us out into the open after a while and we were walking along the side of the hill. We had some wonderful views down into the town but the girls were mostly interested pulling bits of sticky weed from the hedgerows and making crowns from it! We took a break at the top of the hill and sat to look at the view for a few minutes to give the girls a chance to have a drink and sit down. We then walked back past the visitor centre into the Iron Age Hill Fort to do our circle and hand out letters as it is a nice large field (the fort is marked out by marks in the ground).
We had absolute chaos as we walked round to the field though as there were a couple of cows grazing in there. Quite a lot of the girls panicked and thought that the cows were going to come and attack them. We pointed out that they were just grazing and were only looking over because the girls were making lot of noise but a couple of them weren't convinced and thought that they were plotting against us and were going to trap us in (one cow was walking across the only way out on its way to more grass)! We got them into a circle finally and handed out a few letters for the next few weeks and then were about to start Brownie Bells when a cow wandered too close for comfort for most of the girls and our circle collectively ran away from it! It then paused in its tracks because they were all running and screaming which made the worse as they thought it was going to come towards them. Eventually it moved on and semi-normality was returned to the circle so we could actually end the meeting. We then headed back to the visitor centre to meet the parents; quite a few of the girls ran to the gate and then were yelling at us to hurry up so they could get out of the field. Handing the girls back to their parents took a surprisingly short amount of time and finally we could leave ourselves.
It was quite a pleasant walk, not too hot that everyone was tired and grumpy but warm enough to not have to wear a coat or jacket. I was particularly entertained by the number of girls who were scared by the cows and it made me wonder about how this generation copes with the outdoors. None of them seemed to know very much about the outdoors, whereas I, although I was keeping one eye on the cows, was perfectly comfortable walking through the field and being around them. I don't know whether its a lack of education they're getting or whether it's something to do with the fact that they spend less time outdoors - many of our girls have mobile phones, iPods, iPads and tablets whereas I didn't have any of those until I had started at secondary school and I spent more time outdoors around animals. Either way, I think we have to educate the girls in the ways of the outdoors and get them outside more so that they are not so scared of everything.
By the time you read this, I will have finished my last exam so I have the whole summer ahead of me to do Guiding related things! I am planning on working towards parts of Look Wider as I now have 3 months to kill before hopefully moving to university so I will keep you updated on my progress as I go too!
This week we took the girls up the local hill, as we had planned to do when we couldn't use the hall because of voting. When we told them last time that it had been cancelled, many of them were upset and several asked us when we were going to do it instead so we slotted it in to this week.
We had a minor crisis just before as two of our leaders couldn't come due to family circumstances and that put us below the required ratio. Brown Owl put out a quick email to the parents asking if anyone would mind staying and a few said they would join us so we were covered once again! We knew that a few of the girls have dogs and their parents were planning on using the opportunity to walk the dog while we were up there so we knew it wouldn't be too much of a problem, it was just a case of letting them know. We ended up having 4/5 join us in the end!
We met the girls by the visitor centre at the top of the hill and checked everyone off on the register. When everyone had arrived, we had a brief discussion as to which way we were going to go; there were three choices from where we were at that point! There was quite a lot of shouting and pointing until we finally settled on heading into the woods. We set off with the Leaders and parents interspersed with the girls and the express instruction that everyone must stay within sight and not go through any gates without the rest of the group. At each junction in the path we pretty much left it up to the girls at the front as to which way we were going to go, except towards the beginning where the path they chose was back towards the visitor centre already! Quite a few of the girls picked up sticks to use as walking sticks and there were a few that were being carried by two or three girls that were pretty large. We're still not quite sure why they were carrying them - no one could get a straight answer out of the girls - but we let them carry on unless it was being waved around too much and in danger of hitting other girls/leaders.
We came a cross a couple of members of the public who looked at us as if we were slightly mad to be taking so many girls for a walk and then deliberately chose the path we didn't because we were making quite a bit of noise too! Our walk took us out into the open after a while and we were walking along the side of the hill. We had some wonderful views down into the town but the girls were mostly interested pulling bits of sticky weed from the hedgerows and making crowns from it! We took a break at the top of the hill and sat to look at the view for a few minutes to give the girls a chance to have a drink and sit down. We then walked back past the visitor centre into the Iron Age Hill Fort to do our circle and hand out letters as it is a nice large field (the fort is marked out by marks in the ground).
We had absolute chaos as we walked round to the field though as there were a couple of cows grazing in there. Quite a lot of the girls panicked and thought that the cows were going to come and attack them. We pointed out that they were just grazing and were only looking over because the girls were making lot of noise but a couple of them weren't convinced and thought that they were plotting against us and were going to trap us in (one cow was walking across the only way out on its way to more grass)! We got them into a circle finally and handed out a few letters for the next few weeks and then were about to start Brownie Bells when a cow wandered too close for comfort for most of the girls and our circle collectively ran away from it! It then paused in its tracks because they were all running and screaming which made the worse as they thought it was going to come towards them. Eventually it moved on and semi-normality was returned to the circle so we could actually end the meeting. We then headed back to the visitor centre to meet the parents; quite a few of the girls ran to the gate and then were yelling at us to hurry up so they could get out of the field. Handing the girls back to their parents took a surprisingly short amount of time and finally we could leave ourselves.
It was quite a pleasant walk, not too hot that everyone was tired and grumpy but warm enough to not have to wear a coat or jacket. I was particularly entertained by the number of girls who were scared by the cows and it made me wonder about how this generation copes with the outdoors. None of them seemed to know very much about the outdoors, whereas I, although I was keeping one eye on the cows, was perfectly comfortable walking through the field and being around them. I don't know whether its a lack of education they're getting or whether it's something to do with the fact that they spend less time outdoors - many of our girls have mobile phones, iPods, iPads and tablets whereas I didn't have any of those until I had started at secondary school and I spent more time outdoors around animals. Either way, I think we have to educate the girls in the ways of the outdoors and get them outside more so that they are not so scared of everything.
By the time you read this, I will have finished my last exam so I have the whole summer ahead of me to do Guiding related things! I am planning on working towards parts of Look Wider as I now have 3 months to kill before hopefully moving to university so I will keep you updated on my progress as I go too!
Monday 16 June 2014
Visitor from National Star College
12/06/14
This week we had a visit from a local charity, National Star College. One of the girls suggested it as her mum works there and she came, along with a colleague, to tell the girls about what they do and do a couple of activities. They first sat the girls in a circle and told them all about what the College does. Basically, it is a college for children and adults with disabilities where they can "realise their potential as equal and active citizens in control of their lives". They asked the girls if they knew what a charity was, what it meant to have a disability and then talked about the various kinds of disabilities. I was very surprised at the answer given when they were asked what a disability is: "when someone can't do something because the part of their body that helps them do it doesn't work any more"! When I was 9, as the girl who said this is, I would never have been able to say it so concisely and cover all possibilities in one sentence...
They then got the girls to get into groups to do some activities revolving around removing the use of a certain part of the body and trying to do basic tasks. They had to:
They then got the girls back into a circle and discussed how they found the activities and how they would feel if they had to live like that all the time. Most of the girls said that it made them feel frustrated and they wouldn't like to live like that. They then said that any money we raise (we've had to postpone our fundraising to September because we ran out of space in the term to do it, sadly) will go towards helping the students feel more independent and less frustrated as they'll be able to buy specialist equipment to help them.
This week we had a visit from a local charity, National Star College. One of the girls suggested it as her mum works there and she came, along with a colleague, to tell the girls about what they do and do a couple of activities. They first sat the girls in a circle and told them all about what the College does. Basically, it is a college for children and adults with disabilities where they can "realise their potential as equal and active citizens in control of their lives". They asked the girls if they knew what a charity was, what it meant to have a disability and then talked about the various kinds of disabilities. I was very surprised at the answer given when they were asked what a disability is: "when someone can't do something because the part of their body that helps them do it doesn't work any more"! When I was 9, as the girl who said this is, I would never have been able to say it so concisely and cover all possibilities in one sentence...
They then got the girls to get into groups to do some activities revolving around removing the use of a certain part of the body and trying to do basic tasks. They had to:
- Pick up a coin with a sock on their hand
- Put a sock on with one hand in a sling
- Talk to a friend while holding a lollypop stick in their mouth and see how much they could understand
- Tell a friend something by pointing at letters on an alphabet sheet
They then got the girls back into a circle and discussed how they found the activities and how they would feel if they had to live like that all the time. Most of the girls said that it made them feel frustrated and they wouldn't like to live like that. They then said that any money we raise (we've had to postpone our fundraising to September because we ran out of space in the term to do it, sadly) will go towards helping the students feel more independent and less frustrated as they'll be able to buy specialist equipment to help them.
They finished up by giving the girls some stars to colour in and said they could do it any way they liked as long as they didn't use their normal writing hand! We had some girls colouring with their non-dominant hand, some with their feet, some with their mouths and one girl who held the pen between her elbows! Some of the colouring wasn't too bad either.
The girls seemed to thoroughly enjoy the evening as it was more hands on than previous visitors we've had. Most people seem to forget what age group they're talking to and give the talk they would give to adults which just makes the girls bored and thus restless and disruptive. These two women though kept them interested by asking them questions and giving them an activity to break things up. It also gave me an insight into what the girls know about disabilities - a surprising amount!
Tuesday 10 June 2014
Trip to Hobbycraft
05/06/14
This week we went to the local Hobbycraft and did some crafts. For those of you who don't know, Hobbycraft is a craft shop here in the UK. We buy a lot of our craft material from here (or just wander round and get ideas for crafts!) and they are very interested in getting involved with the local community. They run sessions for groups, providing the materials for whatever you want to do and instructing the girls. It's only £1 per girl and the money raised goes to various charities. We went last year and the girls thoroughly enjoyed it so we did it again this year.
This year we did decoupage boxes, clay pots and bracelets. The girls were split into three groups initially and started on one of the three activities and then could move onto a different one whenever they had finished. Each activity was run by a Hobbycraft employee so all us leaders had to do was make sure no one had any arguments and escort them to the toilets. I spent a lot of the evening going up and down the stairs as we were doing the activities on the ground floor and the toilets were on the first floor. As there were members of the public in the shop too we didn't want to send them upstairs on their own (and the doors were quite heavy) so a leader had to always be with them, and it ended up being me. I'm not really complaining though, it was quite a good workout amd it gave me some one on one time with a few of the girl too!
I then spent the rest of the time keeping an eye on the few girls who'd finished first - they hadn't rushed, they're just quicker than the others. The first girl to finish was our newest member (so new she's not even made her Promise yet!) and the two of us walked around the shop looking for a bouncy ball as all girls were allowed to bring money and that was what she wanted to buy with hers. Unfortunately, after asking an employee, we found out they didn't sell any so I helped her look for something else. It was really nice to get to talk to her as her older sister has just left us but they're completely different. I like that you can get two siblings who are so different as it reminds me that, just because girls are related, doesn't mean they will be identical (and it reminds me of my sister and me!). A few other girls then joined us and I was keeping an eye on them while the other leaders helped the others finish and started helping to tidy up. It is quite hard to keep track of 25 girls in a shop the size of Hobbycraft as there are so many different aisles they could be down and it's really easy to lose track of them. Our main focus was just that they were not allowed to leave the shop; at least that way we knew they were inside somewhere and not too far away. At one point they found the princess aisle and we had a couple of them with crowns and hats on and two others having a mock sword fight with some foam swords! I didn't interrupt except to tell them to be careful with the swords or they'd have to pay for them (they weren't actually making contact but I just thought I should warn them) and it was quite entertaining to watch!
All in all it was a very enjoyable evening, as it was last year. The girls all seemed to be having fun and we didn't lose any of them! The only comment we had about it was that there wasn't much for the ones who'd finished to do - we would have given them something to colour or a wordsearch if we were in our meeting place - and it's quite hard for a single leader to keep track of lots of girls in the shop.
I apologise if these posts are later than usual; I am in the middle of my A level exams so don't have as much time to sit down and write a post but I will try my best to keep them coming as regularly as possible over the next 3 weeks.
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