Beavers

Here is a fun relay game that I came up with to play with the Beavers at Camp Opemikon this past weekend. In a slightly altered form it would be appropriate for just about any aged Scout. At this age it is best to do as a father-and-son relay (or "parent-and-child" if your colony has girls). For older kids you could do real races with heats down to first, second and third place. For Beavers it was not really about winning - just about having fun. The fathers did a lot of the work, but we encouraged them to try as much as possible to just help the Beaver do it himself, and then only do it after a good effort was given. And in the end we did not really keep track of who finished first - but rather, we made sure to give each boy kudos in some way or another. e.g. in each heat one boy would get "furthest distance", another would get "closest to the mark", and another might get "straightest cast".

For Beaver age kids you start out with a rod and reel for each team in the heat - we did 3 at a time. The reel is already attached to the rod, and strung with fishing line, but the line is not strung through the eyes in the rod, and there is no tackle on the end of the line. For older kids you may want to consider having them start with the reel not yet attached to the rod, and have them attach it. Or even go so far as to have them string the reel with line first, and then attach it to the rod. For Beavers it was enough to just have them string the line through the eyes in the rod. Beforehand we showed the fathers how to tie a fisherman's knot.

This weekend we took our Beaver Colony (ages 5 through 7, with some 8 year olds depending on birthdates) to Camp Opemikon - arrived Friday evening and left this morning. I have a lot more to write about our trip, but for the moment I only want to scribe a bit about the Compass Challenge that I came up with as an activity for the boys. Earlier this year we did a bit of compass work with the boys - but at this age anything too complicated can be hit-and-miss. A few of the older boys got it no problem, so I wanted to take the opportunity to do an exercise on compass work while we were at camp. This was my first time at Opemikon, so there was not much I was able to do in advance to prepare for it Hopefully this article will be useful to someone else in my position, in the future.

One of the things I've been trying to do this year is have activities that the older boys can learn quickly and then teach to the younger ones. Scouting is supposed to be in part about leadership, and I think this is a good way to try to teach it to the boys. It is also a useful tool because the other boys seem to behave better when it is one of their peers trying to lead them through an activity, so it is also a bit self-serving. We had about 90 minutes of free time in the program first thing Saturday morning, so I took my 2 boys on a walk through the woods to map out a course. My oldest son is 8 and is a "silver tail" Beaver, which means he is actually of Cub age but still going to beavers. In our case our troop does not have Cubs because we did not have enough interest this year at that age. My son should have "swum up" to cubs about 2 months ago. In any case I lead them through a quick 15 minute course, taking notes as we went along. I then found the other 3 silver tails in our colony and lead them each through it 1 by 1, in most cases with their father tagging along. 2 of the 4 boys got it right away, and later went on to do a very good job of leading their peers through the course, explaining things to them as they went along. As I told the Silvers when I was showing them the course, I did not want them to give the answers to the other Beavers, but rather wanted them to help the other Beavers find the answers themselves.

Today was the 24th Ottawa Beavers' Lemonade sale, to raise money for their camping trip next month. I and another leader each made up a 20 litre batch of our "secret recipe", and we headed off to the bike path near the river, where we knew there would be lots of traffic. This is the same place where we took the Beavers fishing a month or so ago, and the same place where I take the boys fishing a few times a week. In hindsight the bike path traffic was not as great as we'd anticipated, because as it turns out the path splits in two about 500 meters on one side of where we were, and joins back up about 500 meters on the other side, and most of the through traffic takes the other branch. But we still raised 90 bucks for our camping trip, and next time around we'll choose our location a bit more carefully and I bet we'll easily double that!

The kids had a really great time - we were there for just shy of two hours, and of course 5, 6 and 7 year old boys being what they are, they spent at least as much time chasing the geese and throwing rocks in the river, as they did peddling lemonade. Incidentally, here is the recipe I use.

• 4 x 1L can apple juice
• 2.5 cups lemon juice (or lemon/lime mixed if you like)
• fill to 20 litres with water

We originally started making sugar free lemonade a few years ago because friends of ours have a daughter who is hypoglycemic, so we would always make stuff that she could drink too since she cannot have drinks with sugar. But we liked it so much we kept making it that way. The other leader made a more traditional recipe which he got from his mom - made with sugar and lots of real lemons. Both of them were really great.

Next week for our Beavers meeting, we'll be taking the boys fishing on the Ottawa River right here in the neighbourhood. The following is a slightly revised version of the email that is going out to parents about it.

We'll be going fishing at Remic Rapids, on the Ottawa River across from Tunney's Pasture. It is an NCC property directly across from Tunney's, and very easy to find. Take the Parkway west bound from Parkdale, and it is the first set of lights. On the left you'll see the exit for Tunney's, and on the right you'll see the road to Remic Rapids.

If you are a parent and think that fishing is something you'd like to do with your kids, Remic Rapids is a really good fishing spot that is close by, so you may want to pick up a rod and reel, and a bit of tackle. Both Canadian Tire and Le Baron are great places to buy fishing supplies. You can often find inexpensive kids' rod-and-reel combos in the $20 range. These work fine for the most part though can be more prone to line tangles - you'll probably end up with 1 or 2 "birds nests" on your reel per season. It is not a big deal to sort out though - definitely worth the money. That's what my boys started with. If you want something better than that for yourself, there are often sale racks at Le Baron and you can often get a really nice setup in the $50 to $60 range. Last summer I got a really nice reel on sale for about $25, and there were some nice rods on the sale rack in the same price range. Then there is also yard sales - last summer I picked up a huge bundle of rods and reels for $1 for the whole bundle, and managed to get 3 or 4 good rods and reels out of it all (these are the extras we have on hand for the kids). In fact 2 of them were so good that I retired the cheap rod/reel combo I'd bought for the boys to share, and was able to give them each their own rod and reel - in their favorite colour even!

Here is a (slightly modified to remove some personal details) email that I just sent out to parents of the 24th Ottawa Beavers and Scouts. If you happen to be involved with the Scouting movement in Ottawa but are not a member of one of the below groups, yet would still like to get involved in this fundraiser, please feel free to contact me as we'd love to include you!

Otherwise if you just live in the area, please drop by and enjoy some hot chocolate, and make a donation to a good cause!

This week's Beaver meeting involved a lesson on trees, along with an associated craft. To prepare, I went around the neighbourhood picking leaves off the trees. While many had fallen, there were still lots left - some not even turned colour yet. As far as softwoods go, I only took in 2 samples - a small clipping from the spruce in our backyard, and another small clipping from our cedar hedge. The main reason for this was that the craft involved the leaves of the hardwoods. Speaking of which, I managed to get a good number of leaves from White Oak, Sugar Maple, Manitoba Maple (which I learned when looking it up, is actually a 'real' maple, contrary to popular belief), Red Maple, Corkscrew Willow, Service Berry (really nice red all year long), Mountain Ash (Dogberry), Chestnut, and yet another type of maple whose name I could not find in the short time I had to look it up.

I started the talk with a few words about the importance of Nature in the Scouting movement, and reminded the boys that our Beaver Promise is to take care of the world. I also painted a wondrous picture for them and said that if you took an experienced Scout and blindfolded him, and dropped him anywhere in Canada, he'd be able to tell you where he is based on trees, and other vegetation and animals that he saw around him. As an example I then held up the piece of Cedar I had, and mentioned that in Nova Scotia, where I am from, cedars are very uncommon.

Last year my oldest son was hearing a lot of great stuff from his friends about Beavers, which here in Canada is the entry level into the Scouting movement - for 5 to 7 year olds. Unfortunately the Colony that his friends went (and still go) to meet on Thursday nights, and we already had something in that timeslot on a regular basis. So I went looking around and found another nearby colony that had been on hiatus for a couple of years because they had no leaders. They were trying to get back together and needed volunteers - so I volunteered!

That was last May. The process includes an interview, a police records check, and a number of other steps, but I had them all completed for September when the first meeting was to take place. The other night was our Colony's 2nd meeting, and it was a great success! There are 10 kids, and one of the other parents volunteered to be a leader as well, so we have things well underway.