Cub Scouts have their next get together for July on Wednesday, July 22, at 6:00 p.m. The theme is "Game Night" and we will be meeting at St. Paul's in the cafeteria. We will bring various board games for indoor play and if anyone has a nice game for 6-11 year olds, please bring it. I envision several games going on at once. We will have refreshments.
August 29, Saturday, in the afternoon, we will have bowling at Leesburg Lanes for fun/membership drive. Scouts bowl free, the Pack will cover their cost. Times to be determined later
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August 31, Monday evening, will be our first Pack meeting. This will be at 6 p.m. Why a Pack meeting first? Because this will serve as an orientation for everyone, parents and kids. How Den meetings will be run, Pack meetings will be run, upcoming events like Popcorn sales and October camping, etc. Also, introduce leaders and identify need for leaders and fill those positions. This way, when Den meetings do start on September 14 (since Monday, September 7, is Labor Day) we have two Den meetings (Sept 14 and 21) and our first Pack meeting on September 28.
All meetings will now be on Monday evening, Pack meetings the end of the month and to be determined during planning this August.
Committee meetings will be held the first Monday evening AFTER that month's Roundtable meeting. This makes more sense since we can now take what we learn there and incorporate it more quickly into our group.
Gone are the days when I get up in front of the Pack and bore the parents and kids with me talking for 45 minutes. Each Pack meeting will now be "hosted" each month by a different den. This means that for the September meeting, the Webelos will be in charge of the opening/closing flag ceremony and a themed skit or presentation. That's their "bad" news, their good news is that when they finish, they don't do this again until January. The Bear den will host October, the Wolf den will host November and the Tigers will host December.
The July Roundtable meeting saw the release of the 2009-2010 "Program Helps" guide for Cubs for the year. I would like to follow that planning book more closely for the Pack meetings. Den meetings are more up to the discretion of the Den leaders but the Pack meetings will follow this guide more closely. Now we can plan the year more completely.
I'll help the Webelos first. The theme for September is "Cub Scout Pockets." Led by the Webelos, all scouts are invited to bring their collection be it old pennies, baseball cards or sand from beaches they visited around the state or country. For the Webelos, their "skit" or presentation can be telling about a field trip they took to a museum in the area to look at collections or even a presentation on how to start collecting for the younger boys. We'll give out awards, cover Pack business, have the closing flag and have a nice hour long meeting that the boys basically run.
The Bears, hosting October, will be assigned "Jungle Safari." May sound dumb right now, but they can discuss conservation, wildlife programs in the area, etc. They can visit the sewage treatment plant that month and discuss how water is recycled and how we need to protect our environment. There are a lot of options here.
November, Wolf den, the theme is "Cub Scouts Salute," and with this they can talk about who their heroes are and why.
December, the Tiger den, the theme is "Works of Art." This has a lot of options the young kids will like and we will discuss this later. They'll like the idea that the meeting ends with a party !
I have always like the idea of having at least one big group event every 6-8 weeks during the scouting year, be it a bike trip, camping or a hike. We'll get something together for September but October is definitely camping for Halloween at La-No-Che.
THIS ONLY WORKS IF THE PARENTS ARE WILLING TO PARTICIPATE, THOUGH.
I'm looking forward to a good year, a good group of kids and parents willing to help make this happen. I'm also looking forward to working with both Bryson Shubin and Jordan Saez as our new Den Chiefs as they rotate through the different dens to gain leadership experience.
This economy still stinks so let's remember to take a break every now and then to enjoy our kids growing up and cook a marshmallow with them or get them out bike riding.
Nick Przystawski, D.P.M.
Cubmaster - Pack 213
Leesburg, FL