A Scoutmaster's Blog

The Pinewood Derby is a highlight of nearly every Cub Scout’s program year. The Cub Scouts love to race their homemade car down the derby track, and hopefully, their car will be the one to cross the finish line first to advance to the next level of the races. Even the siblings and parents, especially the fathers, really get into the races. It ends up being a great evening activity.

I attended the Cub Scout Pack 68 derby in March 2012. I took video during the races (which still has to be edited) and pictures before and after the races, including the presentation of the awards. This video entry to the Melrose Scout Productions Podcast features these pictures in a slideshow style format. There are a lot of smiling faces to be seen, along with a picture of each Scout and his car.

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Cub Scout Pack 68 of Melrose held their first meeting of the new program year last week Tuesday at the high school cafeteria. After the opening ceremony, Cubmaster Mark sat down with the new and older Cub Scouts for a short talk. Then the boys split off by age group to different tables to create posters representing their dens. At least one parent sat down with each group to help get them started.

It was fun watching the Scouts get down to business. Crayons, markers, foam sheets, and glue were available to create the 18″ x 24″ tag board posters. The foam sheets allowed the boys to add a third dimension to their artwork.

The six Webelos Scouts went right to work. It did not take them long to agree to a Webelos Team Ninja theme. There was only one Bear Scout and one Wold Scout in attendance so they worked together to create a poster featuring a bear print and a wolf print. The first grade Tigers needed a little help getting started but in a short time they were just as focused on their masterpiece as were the Webelos Scouts.

Once the cubmaster saw that the boys were all busy he called the parents together in another part of the room for a short meeting. After several minutes I noticed a couple of the mothers glancing around the room with confused looks on their faces. I knew it was not about anything the cubmaster was talking about so I asked them what was on their mind. At least two of them were surprised to see the boys still working together on their posters without any adult supervision at any table.

That is right folks! The Cub Scout dens were completing a goal on their own without an adult looking over their shoulder and telling them what they should do. Even the first graders were working hard. Granted, the parents were still in the room but the boys were working on their own, by age group, each group working together on their poster. And they were having fun!

I honestly believe this may have been the first time these mothers have noticed their sons working and playing with other boys without having an adult watching over their shoulder and guiding their every move for more then two minutes at a time. Kind of amazing, isn’t it?

Welcome to the world of Scouting!

I saw this new (?) poster online today to promote Cub Scouting. I thought it was fantastic! With all the hype this past year about the Dark Knight (Batman) and the Avengers, and the new Superman movie due out soon, I think it would work well with today’s youth.

From the look of the writing on the bottom it looks like it is a B.S.A. poster, but I could not find it on the Scouting.org website. Has anyone used this poster this fall? How has the response been?

This image came from http://davehepp.com/ .

Nascar may be one of the most popular sports in the country but it may not be on a Cub Scout’s radar during the next couple of months as Packs across the nation prepare for one of the biggest annual Cub Scout events: The Pinewood Derby! Hundreds of thousands of Pinewood Derby cars are about to be distributed across the 50 states. Young boys and their fathers (or mothers or older siblings) will take that block of wood and attempt to create an awesome work of art that is also speedy enough to race down the track and earn its owner the victory trophy.

I attended Cub Scout Pack’s derby last year along with three of the Boy Scouts who had younger brothers in the pack. It was the first time I had been able to attend a derby in several years. The races were usually held the same night as our troop’s patrol leader council meeting. I brought my camera and became the evening’s unofficial photographer, taking dozens of pictures of the boys and their cars.

It took the fathers awhile to set up the track and get the lanes to run smoothly because it had been a couple of years since the last Pinewood Derby. The pack membership had dwindled down to just a couple of Cub Scouts, but last year there were eight of them. And they were ready to race!

The adults kept the atmosphere light. The emphasis was to keep the races fun and exciting. Even though it was a double elimination tournament, the competitive aspect of the evening was downplayed. Each of the eight Cub Scouts received a trophy, though the top place trophies were a little larger.

The Cub Scouts had a great time. They continued racing their cars after the formal races had been completed. Even the Boy Scouts got to race their cars against each other. Toward the end of the evening the Cub Scouts were racing the Boy Scouts to see who had the better cars.

The Pack has added a few more members this past year so the next derby promises to be a little bigger and a little more exciting. I plan to attend the event again and be the unofficial photographer. It should be a great night in February.

By the way, here is a fun thing I did with some of the pictures taken at last years Pinewood Derby. I used them to create Derby Cards of each of the racers. The boys thought they were pretty cool. Check them out at Pinewood Derby Cards (100 DoS: Day 6) .

The Cub Scouts of Pack 68 met on Thursday, October 27, for some Halloween fun. The cubmaster and committee had brought plenty of paints and pumpkins so that each Scout had one to decorate. Once the boys were done painting the orange gourds they moved on to decorating cookies for the holiday. While most of the pumpkins made it home to sit on a front porch, many of the cookies did not survive long enough to leave the building. I guess the Cub Scouts must have worked up an appetite.

During a pack meeting last spring, the Cub Scouts of Melrose Pack 68, along with their fathers, played with some marshmallows and spaghetti to create towers and things. The boys were actually working on a requirement for one of their awards, but I do not think they realized it. They were having fun, and that was all that mattered. A couple of the Cub Scouts decided to find out how much weight their towers could support. A scale and some rocks were brought out. It surprised the boys and their fathers to see how many rocks the towers could carry. At the end of the meeting, one group of Cubs decided it was time to demolish their tower. It was a great way to end this video of Melrose Scout Productions.

Have you tried this activity in your den or pack? If so, how did the Scouts enjoy it?

Click here to DOWNLOAD and watch this Podcast.
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Leave feedback here, at iTunes, or on the forums at PTC Media.

If you follow The Buckets comic strip you know that the youngest member of the household, Eddie, is a Cub Scout, and his father is a Pack leader. A few times a year Greg Cravens, the creator of the strip, uses his comic to share a humorous look at the world of Cub Scouting. Mr. Cravens obvious knows a little about the Scouting program because his comics can hit very close to home. I am sure many Pack Leaders and families can identify with the situations he shares with us. ( I sometimes wonder if Mr. Cravens is not a Cub Scout leader in his community.)

Mr. Cravens recently featured a weeklong series in which the Cub Scout Pack goes on a camping trip. If you have ever taken Scouts on a camping trip I am sure you will find these hitting the mark. Here is a quick rundown of the comic strips and the links:

A trip is announced / A pocket knife is needed: Click HERE.
The first rule of camping: Click HERE.
My last dry clothes: Click HERE.
How to gather the Scouts: Click HERE.
Texting while hiking: Click HERE.
A tick is on me! : Click HERE.

While these comic strips feature Cub Scout age boys, many of them could also apply to Boy Scout age youth. Enjoy.

Men like their trucks. Young boys like playing with their small trucks. Both like monster trucks. When Cub Scouts are invited to tour the shop of a monster truck you can bet they and their fathers are going to attend.

Paul Strong, owner and driver of the monster truck, Martial Law, and Kaila Savage, driver of Heart Breaker, recently invited two Cub Scout packs and our Boy Scout troop to take a tour of their shop in Albany, Minnesota. Paul showed off some the parts commonly replaced in trucks while explaining how much time is spent working on them to get them ready for the shows. The boys enjoyed the tour and had plenty of questions for Paul.

After the tour, the Scouts had the chance to crawl inside Heart Breaker to have their picture taken. They also had their photograph taken with Paul and Kaila in front of the truck. The drivers autographed photos of the truck for the boys. The tour ended with Paul and Kaila providing sodas for their guests. Paul even started up the engine of Heart Breaker for the boys to hear. There were a lot of small hands covering ears while the engine roared.

Pictures of the event can be seen on the troops website at http://melrosetroop68.org/yearlygalleries/yh11.html#Monster_Truck .
A video or two is being planned to post for the Melrose Scout Productions podcast.