A Scoutmaster's Blog

Adults leaders need training. I think most people would agree to that. We need to be trained so that we may properly train our youth leaders to do their job well. Call it “train the trainer” if you want to. We receive this training through various courses offer by our districts and councils. We attend monthly roundtable meetings. The Boy Scouts of America has begun making more online training available so we can do it in the comfort of our homes. And, of course, there are the handbooks and the leaders who came before us.

I have a Twitter account and follow a number of Scouting leaders from around the country. I even follow a few people from other countries. Twitter can sometimes be a pain in the neck when the bots start following you. At others times it can be a great resource. Occasionally, someone will post a link to a great resource they found. Once in a while, someone from an interesting website will find me and start following me. I usually check them out to see if they are worth following in return.

A few days ago a received a new follower so I checked out their website. The site, “Animated Knots”, found at http://www.animatedknots.com/ , is quite a site, if you like knots. They feature animations of how to tie dozens of knots, found under various categories. There are knots for boating, fishing, climbing, and rescue. There is a section of Boy Scout knots which you may find helpful for you troop. be sure to check out the “Decorative” knots if you would like to learn how to tie a monkey’s fist or a turk’s head. Learn these knots and you could be the envy of your troop.

By the way, if you would like to follow me on Twitter you can find me at http://twitter.com/stevejb68 .

100 Days of Scouting: Day 13.

Before there was the internet, dvd’s, or even vhs tapes, council and district training sessions used filmstrips to assist training adult leaders. I happen to own four filmstrips used by our council in the 1980’s. The council was going to throw them in the trash until I said I would take them. I am not really sure why I took them. I do not have a filmstrip projector, nor do I know of anyone who owns one, other than maybe the school. They have been stored with other old Scouting memorabilia in box in my basement.

When I decided to take a picture of them for this article it was the first time in years that they have even been out of the box. I was surprised to see that they are still in excellent condition. It almost makes me want to find a projector to view them again.

The four filmstrips that are part of my Scouting collection are:
How To Select A Scoutmaster.
Boy Scout Orientation.
Unit Organization.
How Much Is It Worth?
All four were created by the Boy Scouts of America Audiovisual Service. Unfortunately, I do not have the scripts or audio tapes that were used with them.

I am curious. How many of you remember using or seeing these filmstrips in training sessions of years gone by? Do you have any as part of your Scouting memorabilia collection?

Those of you who read this blog and follow me on Twitter (stevejb68) may have noticed that out troop has been having some rough times. Last month I sat down with the Boy Scouts during a troop meeting and discussed the future of the troop with them. We needed to make some changes. They seemed to be ready to do what needs to be done. Tonight was a night that really began to take us in that direction.

Tonight’s troop meeting would be the first one in which the new senior patrol leader and his assistant would really take charge of the troop. They had been elected last month but last month’s meetings were a little chaotic and not planned well. This month’s had been planned by the new ASPL (the only Scout who attended the patrol leader council meeting) and were planned out very well.

Even though I have been a scoutmaster for 29 years I have been finding myself being up in front of the boys too much during a troop meeting. Tonight would be different. I pulled my assistant scoutmaster off to the side when he arrived and explained that we are going to sit in back of the room tonight and let the boys run the meeting, something we should have always been doing but were not. I wanted to be behind the boys tonight, out of direct eyesight with them.

The boys did pretty well. Oh, everyone was a bit late coming to the meeting. Yes, there was some goofing off and joking around but they did get much of the meeting’s agenda covered. I only stepped in front of the troop twice for short moments; once to ask a few questions about the menu and plans for the weekend outing at the end of the month followed by a quick uniform inspection, and at the end of the meeting to give announcements and a scoutmaster minute. All in all, it was a successful meeting.

It will be interesting to see how things go during the next few meetings. Actually, for the next few months. I have decided to step back, like a scoutmaster should, and let the boys handle things. It is the best way for them to learn. Unfortunately, I have to re-learn a few things again. Or, may not so much re-learn as much as re-apply the things I already know.

I took the Boy Scouts of America’s Woodbadge training course for adult leaders in 1988. I was a member of the Bobwhite Patrol. I was the patrol’s historian so I took a lot of pictures over the three weekends.

I finally found time to scan my Woodbadge photographs this summer. I recently posted them to an album on my Flickr account at this LINK. I wanted to post some of them to a Flickr Woodbadge photo group but I could not find any except for a couple course specific groups. Well, I thought, I guess I will have to start a group for us Woodbadgers that want to share our photos.

If you have some photos that you would like to share then I invite you to join this new group on Flckr named Woodbadge Photos. You can find it at http://www.flickr.com/groups/woodbadge/

 I did my Woodbadge course in the fall of 1988. Yes, that was long before the current “Woodbadge for the 21st Century”, but I have a feeling the core training is still pretty much the same. The course was held at Camp Stearns in central Minnesota. We camped out, cooked outdoors, and slept in tents. In fact, most of our training was held outdoors. We seldom found ourselves inside the Woodbadge Lodge.

The Friday that I had been both dreading and excited about had arrived. It was time to go to the first weekend of Woodbadge training at Camp Stearns in central Minnesota. I was dreading it because I did not know if I would know anyone in attendance other than Paul, the culprit who signed me up for the training. I am pretty shy and it takes me a while to warm up to new people. But I was also excited because this was Woodbadge, the ultimate Scout leader training course.

I was beginning to feel a little burned out after serving as the scoutmaster of Troop 68 for six years in the fall of 1987. I told Paul, a great Scouting friend of mine, how I was feeling about Scouting. He suggested that I attend a Woodbadge training course. Woodbadge would get me energized.

Last night, when I was checking out a few Scouting related blogs, I had a quick flashback to the early 1990’s. BuffaloEagle, at Lone Star Scouter, had posted a list of the eleven skills of leadership. Upon seeing them I was taken back to my Woodbadge training at Camp Stearns.

The skills are:

Buffalo Eagle wrote that these skills were discussed during a COPE course that he attended. I went through COPE nearly ten years ago, but I do not remember discussing these during the course. Maybe we did. I do not remember. I was having too much fun climbing things and riding the zip line.

The Eleven Skills of Leadership. It has been awhile since I have thought about them. Maybe it is time to review them. Now, where did I put my Woodbadge notebook?