Friday, September 18, 2009

Pow Wow - Cub Leaders Training

WANTED

Untrained and Undertrained Cub Scout Leaders


Description: These notorious individuals vary in height and weight, and sometimes wear olive pants and tan shirts with blue tabs on their shoulders. During the day they pose as wives or husbands, mothers or fathers and may have sons in Cub Scouting. Once a week they gather in basements, schools, churches, or other meeting places with youth dressed in blue uniforms. Also, they have an interest in character development, citizenship training, physical fitness and fun for America's Boys.

An all day round-up for these notorious adults is planed for the Annandale High School, in Annandale, Virginia on November 21, 2009.

Contact the NCAC Sheriff at powwow@gmail.com.

Friday, September 4, 2009

Cubmaster Minute

A campfire is a remarkable thing. It can be bright enough to light the path back to our tent, and it can be small enough to just barely see. Why is this? It’s because of the fuel that we put into the fire – the logs, the kindling, and the oxygen. Sometimes we Cubs are like the campfire. How strong we are is dependent upon the fuel we receive from our leaders and our parents. The better the fuel, the stronger our personal “campfire’ will be. I encourage you to always challenge your den leaders and your parents to give you the best fuel, or the best program, they can give you.

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

"Don’t Fight Your Pack"

An excerpt from: “The Book of Camp-Lore and Wood Craft” originally written by Dan Beard in 1920.

When we speak of ‘fighting the pack’, we mean fighting the load; that does not mean getting one’s load up against a tree and punching it with one’s fists or ‘kicking the stuffings out of it’, but it means complaining and fretting because the load is uncomfortable.…the mind has as much to do with carrying the load as the muscles. If the mind gives up you will fall helpless under a small load; if the mind is strong you will stagger along under a very heavy one.

When I asked a friend, who bears the scars of the pack straps on his body, how he managed to endure the torture of such a load, he replied with a grin that as soon as he found that to ‘fight his pack’ meant to perish – meant death!-he made up his mind to forget the blamed thing and so when the pack wearied him and the straps rubbed the skin off his body, he forced himself to think of the good dinners he had had at the Camp-fire Club of America, yum! yum! Also, of all the jolly stories told by the toastmaster and of the fun he had had at some other entertainments. Often while thinking of these things he caught himself laughing out loud as he trudged along the lone trail, FORGETTING the hateful pack on his back. ‘In this way’, said he, with a winning smile upon his manly and weather-beaten face, ‘I learned how not to fight the pack but to FORGET IT! Then he braced himself up, looked at the snow-capped mountain range ahead, hummed a little cowboy song and trudged on over the frozen snow at a scout’s pace.

Now that you know what a pack is, and what ‘fighting the pack’ means, remember that if one’s studies at school are hard, that is one’s pack. If the work one is doing is very hard, difficult, or tiresome, that is one’s pack. If one’s parents are worried and forget themselves in their worry and speak sharply, that is one’s pack. Don’t fight your pack; remember that you are a woodcrafter; straighten your shoulders, put on your scout smile and hit the trail like a man!

If you find you are tempted to break the Scout Law, that you are at times tempted to forget the Scout Oath, that because your camp mates use language unfit for a woodcrafter or a scout, and you are tempted to do the same, if your playmates play craps and smoke cigarettes, and laugh at you because you refuse to do so, so that you are tempted to join them, these temptations form your pack; don’t give in and fall under your load and whimper like a ‘sissy’ or a ‘mollycoddle’, but straighten up, look the world straight in the eye, and hit the trail like a man!

Some of us are carrying portage packs which we can dump off our shoulders at the end of the ‘carry’, some of us are carrying hiking packs which we must carry through life and can never dump from our shoulders until we cross the Grand Portage from which no voyagers ever return. All our packs vary in weight, but none of them is easy to carry if we fret and fume and complain under the load."

What great words of wisdom, that we can all learn from as we carry our "packs" on hikes and through life.

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Monthly Theme: Cub Scout Pockets

What can possibly be in a Cub Scout's pocket? What is in a boy's pocket can tell a lot about who he is and what he likes.The boys can share and show off their collections and maybe even start a new one! Put some marbles in the boy's pockets and teach him how to play the game of marbles. Pick an interest of the boys and go on a field trip to explore and learn about it. Maybe a trip to a rock quarry in search of fossils, or a nature hike around the den meeting site to pick up items. This is also a great month to educate the boys on what can go on their uniform and then make some goals to accomplish their rank advancement, special awards, belt loops and pins, and involvement in camps and council events. This might be a good month to work on the Collecting or Marbles belt loopand pin.

Some of the purposes of Cub Scouting developed through this month’s theme are:

Family Understanding, Cub Scouts and their family members share memories through their collections.
Personal Achievement, Boys take pride in their new interests and collections.
Fun and Adventure, Starting a new hobby is an adventure that can lead to hours of FUN

The core value highlighted this month is:
Honesty: While enjoying and sharing their hobby of collecting, the boys will learn the importance of being trustworthy and loyal.
Cooperation: Cub Scouts will find that when they work together with their buddies, they will have lots of new ideas and collectibles to add to their pockets.
Resourcefulness: Cub Scouts have the opportunity to be creative with the treasures found in their pockets.