IamaScoutAMA

IamaScoutAMA wrote

Most conflicts arise regarding chore distribution in their teams of 6.

we only spend 3-4 weeks total a year with them and try to tackle multiple themes at a time so our scope is not extraordinary.

I find it easier to apply with 14+ than with children or younger adolescents since anything linked to language quickly becomes quite abstract and too theoretical for them. Older scouts "get" what I'm trying to teach them and have the ability to (hopefully) reuse it when not with us. Young scouts will do the activity and comply to the rules, but wont remember it: playing in the woods, carving stuff with their knives, building fires, getting dirty and interacting with others will have as much of a positive impact as what we adults prepare for them.

It's a slight exaggeration to say this, but I feel like scouts are being prepared to become old scouts, at which point the education really begins.

That's why I prefer letting the "less woke" adults look after the younger ones while tackling the older ones myself: it's more fun to find games that check whatever value i want to teach them while making them have fun, and I feel like I have a greater impact here.

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IamaScoutAMA wrote

We're trying to teach non-violent communication and peer mediation with my scout group.

We focused on separating feelings and actions when comparing "stories" when we're trying to resolve a conflict.

It's sad how little vocabulary people use when dealing with emotions, when there are 100s of them.

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IamaScoutAMA wrote

We've started a new scouting year, our aim this time is to work on solidarity. We are going to help a food bank with the scouts, probably by bagging up groceries at shops. Also we'll try to have a food bank volunteer do an AMA for us. Also some parents are going to help us renovate our room and put up shelves, we'll have more space to store stuff :)

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

Reply to comment by ziq in I do Scouting as praxis, AMA by IamaScoutAMA

Our ideal is to turn children into autonomous and fulfilled adults. The group is a tool to make the individual grow. I personally think the group feeds on individual and vice-versa.

teams have mixed age/competence: there is older one that will do more work than the others, but we try to have them teach the younger ones. Also we give more responsibilities and autonomy to the "good" scouts. By the time the younger kids are old, they are the ones teaching the others.

Another tool is that we can set up a contract between the child and the group in which they decide to learn something by doing something for the group; for example learning knots by making a poster about knots that we can hang up in the group's room; or for a 8-12yo to learn how to speak in front of crowds by organizing a game of soccer and explaining the rules to everyone.

As for the cooking, each team has their own way of doing things: one team did all chores all together, another had a different member do all the chores each day. One team had half the members do the cooking, half do the dishes. Another team chose with a dice roll... Most of the time the kids find some sort of equality without our input.

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

yup, the movement promotes vegetarianism and local food, so everyone is cool with flexitarian meals, but vegan is off charts. Someone told me that feeding my group vegan food for 3 weeks would be forcing my world view onto them. Its bullshit I'm all-ready forcing my world view by restricting phones on my camp.

As you can guess, it's mostly carnists that are against the concept of vegan camps. Some other dude has all ready done a vegan camp last year so I know it's doable, but it's a bit of a battle.

There is gate-keeping since we're an "official" movement with "official" values that each group can interpret as they want. It is not necessarily a bad thing: it stops fashies from making hitler-youth camps.

As I said in my op, the movement is liberal so a bit slow and lagging a little regarding stuff like veganism and zero-waste. We have country-wide assemblies to decide and vote on the orientation of the movement every 5 years thought.

Fuck'em I'm gonna do a vegan camp anyways :D

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

I haven't talked politics with the parents so I don't know precisely where they are on the political spectrum, but I think they're all left-wing or liberals so they share the values of the movement (love and respect of nature, cooperation, autonomy...).

Since we're in an official movement there are some boundaries that I don't cross even if I would like to:

  • law: I want to try mixed sleeping, but it's illegal
  • movement values: there is a small emphasis on religion and spirituality so I cant go around saying all of it is bullshit.
  • my formation: I have youth worker diplomas and know security

The parents help us a lot, especially with organization and accounting, but leave us to do the interactions with the children: menus, games, day to day life...

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

The skills that I value the most in my day to day life aren't the most practical/visible: for me it was cooking, project management... Scouting also influenced my ethics and personality quite a bit.

As I said, most of the skills I learned was by being shown and repeating, or doing stuff myself.

So take a backpack and go hiking to learn how to live in minimalist ways, DIY your furniture with pallets to learn how to build. Or join the scouts :)

Also if you're interested in eco-friendly living, look up zerowaste. If you're interested in survivalism, look up military survival guides.

If you need a friend to go hiking with in EU or UK, hit me up lol

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

UK were the first scouts, so there will probably be scouts in every town. As I said, we are all very different so the experience I narrated here will not necessarily be the same in the UK. You can always try it out for a day or two, scouts are really nice and lenient, especially if they're looking for volunteers.

If you're 19, you may become a rover: in teams of 5-7 they build ambitious projects, often oversees, in order to help and meet new people.You will otherwise be a leader/volunteer, like me :)

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IamaScoutAMA OP wrote

Yeah it's cool. I'm having fun too. My favorite part is to help the teams build their project and seeing them go. We try to make them do everything: initial idea, budget, menus, "selling cookies for $$$" and finally going.

Also during the summer camp, we have 3 days of "walkabouts" where the teams go out autonomously with their sleeping gear and money for food, but no tents, and they need to ask around to find somewhere to sleep. Sometimes they get full bread and breakfast with some old lady, sometimes they sleep in town gymnasiums, or in creepy old churches. That was my favorite part as a kid.

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