November Fun

 November has been SO much fun!!  Swimming...

Learning about how to be friendly, helpful, honest, and kind...
Learning about flowers, art, and quilting... and then making our own mini-quilts!...

We rocked out candy sales (please ignore my drywall... we are ripping wallpaper!)

We've learned how to say "Have a good trip" in several different languages (and made bookmarks to keep up with the new phrases we've learned).

We've learned about the parts of flowers and even ATE different parts of plants: roots (carrots), "flower" (broccoli), and seeds (sunflower seeds)!!

We talked about how seeds are scattered and the different types of seeds and how the wind can blow them FAR FAR FAR away!!  (We did an experiment to show how far seeds could be BLOWN and discussed how WIND could blow even harder!!)

We learned about different types of soil (clay, fertile, sandy) and go to smell and touch the different kinds.

We went on a walk to explore the colors we could find outside and collected leaves to sketch, exploring how each were different colors with different shapes and lines in them.

And, we've made crafts!  Spooky lollipop spiders and ghosts for Halloween.  Leaf art.  And, our thankful turkeys and friendship bracelets (which use daisy petal colors!).

Troop 270 Rules

As we begin to explore our Daisy Green petal - Considerate and Caring, we also begin to look more closely at manners and rules.  --It's an excellent time to drive home the importance of boundaries as well as lot of other great things!

We came up with a list of our basic rules and then we talked about what each of those meant, what it'd look like...

1.  Respect Others and Property - this means no hitting, spitting, kicking, shoving, taking things that aren't yours, bullying, being rude, and not standing on furniture or disrespecting each others' things.
2.  Listen Well - no interrupting, sit nicely, etc.
3. Walk Inside
4.  Always Follow Directions
5.  Do Your Best

And, then we have the consequence ruler - it measures how everyone is doing!

Each color on the stick represents a consequence and each clothespin has a girl's name on it.

Green - They did GREAT and participated nicely!
Yellow - They get a warning
Orange - "Breather" for 5-6 minutes where they sit outside the group and don't participate in group activities for that amount of time (they don't get to make up what they missed)
Red - Call mom and dad/guardians
Purple - this is what they call the "Don't Talk About It " color :P  This color essentially means that the girl will have to skip the next meeting to fully consider her behavior.  The idea is to never get to purple.

They use this method at my daughter's school and it works REALLY great! 

It really helps to have parental involvement, as well.  So, after our meetings and activities, be sure to ask them what color they are on and if they stayed on green, make a HUGE deal about it.  High-fives, and that kind of thing!  It's a big deal!

Friendly and Helpful Daisy Petal

Our girls had a great time earning the yellow petal (friendly and helpful).  The girls talked a lot about what makes a good friend...

And, how we could be friendly and helpful in specific ways.  We also acted out a scenario where a friend was being bullied by another friend and role-played what we could say or do to make things better and stop bullying.

Then, the girls were sent home with 18 slips of paper that looked like this:

And had to do 18 friendly/helpful things at home and come back with a list of what they did.

They loved it!

Want some more ideas???

Driving it Home: Ideas for FRIENDLY and HELPFUL (to help your girl further understand what we're learning about) -

- Read books like:
How to Lose All Your Friends by Nancy Carlson
How to be a friend by Laurie Brown

I am Helpful by Errol Goodman

- Create a chore chart (i have lots of great resources, if you are interested in this). You can even tell them it's for girl scouts! :)

- Have a sleepover

- Invite a friend to sit with you at lunch

- Better yet, invite someone who looks lonely to your table and BE A FRIEND

- Talk about how to make friends (introducing self, things friends do and don't do, etc.)

Shows: Diego, Dora, and Wonder Pets (I'm not necessarily endorsing here, but if your girly likes it, you can bring home the idea after they're done watching!)

Any other ideas? Would love to hear!

Marshmallow Roast! - October 2012

We had a fabulous time roasting marshmallows!

 

Hayrides, a playground, hot dogs, warm apple cider, juice, s'mores roasted over an open fire...

...and, cupcakes...

And, of course, some of the most precious Daisies that you will ever meet!

 October 2012

Ideas To Earn The Honest And Fair Girl Scout Daisy (Light Blue) Petal

To earn our Honest and Fair petal, we:

- Talked about conflict and role-played situations where they might want to do one thing and a friend wants to do another.  Then, we talked about compromise and possible solutions and ideas.
- Discussed how to come to a decision when others have different ideas: drawing sticks, rolling dice, voting, compromising, letting someone else do their idea, taking turns, rock/paper/scissors, etc.
- We hid 9 pencils (for 8 girls) and had them search for the pencils.  When they found a pencil for themselves, they helped the other girls find theirs.  Then, they had to decide what happened with the extra pencil (They gave it back to the leaders).
- We played a game of Liar, Liar - we sat in a circle and the first person told a lie: My hair is pink.  The next person had to repeat the lie before them and add their own: My hair is pink and my cat is purple.  Next person - repeat the previous 2 lies and add their own.  And, so on.  The point was that lies are hard to remember and not worth it.  And, once you start, you have to keep going and going and it's just not worth it.
- We started a game and began ignoring the rules until the girls noticed the unfairness - which led to a great discussion of why it's important to do things fairly and how bad it feels when you are on the receiving end of unfairness.

Other great ideas:

- Read most any Clifford The Big Red Dog books - Fairness and Honesty are common themes throughout.
- Go to the Court House or Library for a field trip to discuss Honesty and Fairness and its importance in the community.
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