I really did love this idea and it's something they can pin to their uniforms and use each meeting or give away as swaps!
Posts filed under Girl scouts
Making Choices Financial Literacy Leaf Badge
This past week, in preparation for our cookie season, we focused on the Making Choices leaf for our Girl Scout daisies.
We had a three station set up (small groups and station rotation works best for our large troop)
Station 1: Cookie booth pricing guides and practice with monopoly money.
Each of the girls had an opportunity to fill in the cookie pricing guide together. They used monopoly money to help them count and determine the prices. After the meeting I laminated the pricing guides for the girls to use at the cookie booths. Our cookie booths last year were very busy and it was soooo time consuming to have the daisy scouts calculate each purchase. By doing this ahead of time each girl got to practice her financial literacy and save us some time during cookie booth sales!
Once they finished their sheets they got to pretend shop and practice their money skills with the monopoly money. They loved this idea!
Here is the link to down:--->>>Download here <<<---
Station 2: Wants VS. Needs activity
The second station consisted of a wants vs. needs sorting activity. An adult volunteer first discussed the differences between the two and each girl had an opportunity to sort the pictures. After each girl had a turn my co -lead assisted in a discussion about wants and needs for our cookie goal. The girls voted to spend their cookie proceeds on wishlist items for a local animal shelter that we had recently visited for our 3 Cheers for Animals Journey. My co lead had the girls list out the items that the animal shelter might need and then think of items that might be a want for the animals. Once we have reached our cookie goal (which I know we will!), the girls can decided if they want to buy "need"ed items or "want"ed items (or both) for the animal shelter by referencing this list.
Free wants and needs pictures here--->>>Download printable here <<<---
Station 3: Cookie Booth brainstorm sesh
We started planning our cookie booth design and decorations in this station. I talked with the girls a little about marketing. It was really cute because of their age. Imagine their faces when you ask "have you every heard of the term marketing?" LOL Here is how I explained the idea....
2 Different books: I used two different books to explain the impact of good marketing. One book was missing it's cover so it was completely white and the second book was decorated with illustrations and fun colors. I asked the girls if they were in a bookstore which book would they be more likely to pick up. Most of the girls picked the pink illustrated book. I asked them why they picked this one.... ex. "It's pink!" or "I like the picture!" I explained how the way the book looked impacted their decision and how this is marketing.
2 Different cookie booths: Using this concept I asked if they saw two different cookie booths (one with just a table and some boxes and another with decorations and color) which booth would they buy their cookies from. They all said the fun decorated one! Rolling with that concept I talked about they way a product is presented can impact our customers decision to buy.
The girls come up with some fun ideas for cookie booth decorations to get our customers excited to buy from us and increase our sales. We talked about themes and they jotted down a list of materials they would need so we can work on the decorations at the next meeting.
It was a very productive meeting filled with lots of decision making and skill building! They really did have so much fun and I could tell they really gained from our activities!
Happy Cookie Season!
How remembers this movie?
Girl Scout Promise Christmas Ornament
Try our fun Girl Scout Christmas ornament that teaches or reinforces the Girl Scout Law!!
The Best Gift for the Baking Girl Scout!
Have you seen it yet? We nearly lost it when we saw it in Target.
It's the new Girl Scouts Easy Bake Oven!
For all of your mini chefs or bakers out there this has to be the perfect gift. When I was little I had my own easy bake oven and it was so much fun. I'm mean, really, who did have one?
Girl Scout Postcard activity and free template!
I recently created this postcard for our Girl Scout activity to go along with the 3 Cheers for Animals Daisy journey and Zinni's story!
The girls can draw a picture on either side and write a little note if they wish! This is a great idea to also use around the holidays or Valentines day if the girls want to send out love bug notes or holiday wishes. This would be fun to send to the troops overseas as well!
Daisy Flower Garden Journey: Garden Party!!!
Wow! We've finally made it to the end of our Daisy Flower Garden Journey! We've had so much fun along the way and be sure to check out our previous sessions here:
Session Five and Take Action Project
Here are some of the highlights from this journey!
- Planted our seedlings in our individual terra cotta pots!
- Learned all about our plant helpers while crafting bee pins, painting our river rocks to create ladybugs, tissue butterflies!
- Created a worm composting bin!
What I would like to add the next time around..
Visit a community garden or plant nursery
Plant a community garden
- Grow ladybugs or butterflies
And now for the GARDEN Party and our year end Court of Awards ceremony!
I made these cute little "cups of dirt" with gummy works to keep with the gardening theme. I took dollar store silk flowers and hot glued them onto the green spoons to make them look like floral stems! The cups of dirt are chocolate pudding and crumbled Oreo cookies.
Court of Awards Ceremony!
This was the first time we had a Court of Awards. In the past the badges were presented to the girls at the end of the meeting but I had saved the last couple badges for this event. I knew I wanted to keep it simple and quick and make sure the girls had some time to partay and play!
The ceremony was held outside in my backyard. It was a beautiful day, despite the wind. Luckily, I have a large 2 tiered deck that was perfect for a ceremony stage! I knew THAT deck would come in handy when we bought the house less than 2 years ago.
Both the co-leader and I got up and said a few things about the year and the girls. I explained the Journey that they had been working on and what each part of the award meant and how the girls demonstrated this. Then we called each girl up and pinned her with the daisy corsage and handed her a certificate for completing the year.
Daisy Corsage
These were pretty easy to make and the girls really adorned them! If you're doing an awards ceremony it's super fun to dress up the package a bit to make the event all the more special.
Materials:
- glue gun
- silk daisy flowers
- assorted matching ribbons (preferable in the colors of the age level)
- puffy or fabric paint
- bar pins
I used dollar store white daisies. I made sure to clip with garden cutters the back of the flower to make sure it was as flat as possible. You can hot glue your ribbon and to the back of the flower and then a bar pin to the back of the daisy. Staple the badges to the ribbons. White puffy paint was used for the girls name. This ceremony was also to reward girls for their fantastic Cookie Sales (which you can see there are a few goal achiever patches).
Presenting the Daisy Flower Garden Awards!
Originally, the Daisy Flower Garden award was presented in each girl's flower pot that they had planted in the very first session. It was a super windy day and the pots kept blowing over so we had to stick these in the large planters I had on my deck.
After the ceremony the girls showed off their decorations (they each got to decorate one of the flower friends and we strung them up with some string) and enjoyed the cups of dirt. We played some music and the girls had a fun time playing in our new playhouse! With it being our first Court of Awards and me being 9 months pregnant, it was kept relatively simple but the girls really enjoyed it and had tons of fun and got to finally take home their plants!
Daisy Flower Garden Journey: Session 5 Take Action Project
We've made it to session 5 of the Daisy Flower Garden Journey!!!
For more resources on the Daisy Flower Garden Journey check out previous sessions....
Session Five and Take Action Project
I've managed to get this journey finished in 6 sessions, including the Court of Awards ceremony and garden party for the last session!
Session 5 is all about the take action project the girls completed as part of the journey. We started the meeting off reading Chapter 5 from our Garden Journey books. Our troop did the worm composting bin for their project but there are endless ideas that you can consider. We did think about doing a community garden at the school but that didn't work out like we had hoped so we went to plan B.
Here are some ideas you can suggest to the girls to get them thinking. Remember: let them decided and keep it girl led.
Ideas for the take action project for the Daisy Flower Garden Journey
Worm composting bin
Create or spruce up a community garden at a local school, church, park district.
Grow ladybugs
- Find a need or issue in your area and have the girls brainstorm ideas to solve it.
Now for the worm composting bin!!!
What you will need:
- two 10 gallon rubbermaid containers w/ lid.
- Food scraps and other organic materials (see list)
- newspaper and cardboard
- water
- drill with small 1/8 drill bit
- Something to separate the two bins on top of one another, you will want about 2-3 inches. We used scrap wood left over from our deck (use resources wisely). You can also use large rocks.
- Red worms about 1/4 to 1/2 pound (we purchased ours from Bass Pro Shop but you can buy them in bulk online)
- dirt... don't buy dirt just what every you can find in your yard. You will want a couple of small garden shovels full.
Ahead of time
Have your Girl Scouts start collecting food scraps ahead of time. Here is the example of the letter I sent home during session 4. Download here: ----->>> Worm composting letter
Prepare your bin
- Decide which bin you will use to put your actual food scraps and worms in. Drill small 1/8 drill bit holes at the bottom to allow for excess water to drain out. Drill larger holes at the top on the sides of the bin, between 1 inch to 4 inches from the top. This will allow for ventilation.
- Take your second bin (bottom bin) and put in your material you will use to separate the two bins. You want to offset the bins by at least 3 -6 inches. This will allow the liquid from the composting bin to drain out so you don't drown the worms. This liquid is also considered compost tea! We used two pieces of scrap 2 x 2 wood, large rocks work as well.
- Place your bin with the drilled holes inside of the bottom bin. Save the lid and you are ready to start adding your goods.
Add your goods!
Now that you have prepared your bin you are ready to get the composting environment started for your worms.
- Add some bedding... What is bedding? It's your paper scraps such as shredded newspaper, paper bags, cardboard. YOu will want to lightly dampen, not soak, with a sprinkle of water.
- Add dirt. This will help the worms with digestion and help the "process" along.
- Add your food scraps... please reference the list provided on the letter on worm composting. I had each girl tells us what her scraps consisted of and add them in. Sprinkle lightly with a little water to moisten.
- Add your worms. For the girls that are not scared of worms (courageous and strong), which ended up being all of them by the time we got down to the last of the worms, have them hold the worms and add them into the bin themselves. Advise them to be gentle and quiet as you don't want to shock the worms. There were girls that were afraid to touch them but after seeing the rest of the troop participate they mustered up the courage. Make sure each girl gets a chance even if she turns down on the first try.
- Cover with bedding. Don't be afraid to be liberal with this. You want to add enough to keep the bugs and flies away from your composting bin. Add some bigger pieces of wet cardboard on the top.
- Put the lid on and let it chill! By chill I mean don't continue to move your bin around and place it in a quiet place. I put it in my garage for the first two weeks. I recommend also putting it in the garage and leaving the light on for the first couple of days.
What I noticed, and I'm glad I put it in my garage to start, was that some of the worms started trying to escape. Some worms trying to escape is normal. You've taken these little creatures and put them into a new environment and potentially shocked them with the move so naturally you will have your rebel worms trying to leave. If you noticed that there are too many trying to leave you will need to troubleshoot your bin for potential problems.
Things to remember:
Temperature: 35 to 80 degrees - covered from sun and rain.
Feed your worms, about every 2 weeks or as you gather new organic matter.
Too wet = worm evacuation. Bins and bedding should not be dripping.
Flies = not enough bedding/ Continue to add bedding to the top to keep the environment happy.
Stenchy = too much food. If your bin starts to smell like something is rotting, you have a problem. Your worm bin should smell earthy, not stenchy. LOL
Do you have any other suggestions for the Take Action project?
At the end of the meeting I handed out special invitations for the last session and final meeting for the year! Here is a copy of the publisher file--->> Court of Awards Ceremony and Garden Party Invitation.
Stay tuned for the final session of our Daisy Flower Garden Journey!
Daisy Flower Garden Journey: Session 4 Plant Helpers
Hello Girl Scout Volunteers!
Today we are continuing on with the Daisy Flower Garden Journey with session 4!
Last session our focus was on the parts of a flower. The theme of this session was all about our plant helpers... aka bees, butterflies, ladybugs, and worms! In case you missed the previous sessions they can be found below...
Start up Activity: (5-10 mins)
Record their seedlings by drawing a picture in their notebooks.
Pg. 61 or pg. 62 from Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden
Activity: Discuss the different plant helpers and their importance. (5-10 min)
I created a quick poster that titled "Plant Helpers" I printed out pictures of a bee, butterfly, ladybug, and worm. We discussed how bees and butterflies help pollinate plants to they bear the fruits and vegetables and without them many of our foods would not exist. We talked about how ladybugs help to keep out certain bugs that are bad for plants and how the worms help to create nutrient rich soil.
Activity: Ladybug Garden Rocks and Read Chap. 4 (30 mins)
Materials:
1 flat rock for each girl (river rocks work great and you can buy a bag of them at the Dollar Tree)
Red, Black, and white(optional) paint
small paint brushes or q-tip
Have the girls create their own garden protectors by painting their rocks to look like ladybugs. First, start by painting the entire rock red. Allow it to dry for 10 minutes. Then add black spots and the black head. You can use the back tip of the paint brush to create the small spots. This might be easier for the girls. Allow to dry. If you have enough time you can add two with dots on the head for the eyes. While the girls are painting and you allow time in between to dry READ chapter 4 from Welcome to the Daisy Flower Garden.
Activity: Tissue Butterfly (10 mins)
Materials
colorful pipe cleaner
8 in x 8 in tissue paper
clothes pin
black marker or crayons for decoration
googly eyes (optional and requires glue and time to dry)
Fold the tissue paper accordion style leaving about an inch in between folds. Then crunch the center to fit in the clothes pin and fan out the tissue. Fold the pipe cleaners in half and curl up the ends to look like antennas. At the fold, insert the antennas into the tissue butterfly. Have the girls add in eye and decorate the body of the butterfly as they chose.
Discuss the Take Action Project (5 mins)
After we finished our projects and washed up and cleaned off the tables we sat down for our closing ceremony. We used this time to discuss ideas for our Take Action project and the girls were interested in the Worm Composting idea! Other ideas that we discussed was planting a community garden at the school, and raising ladybugs or butterflies.
Wrap up with a Friendship Squeeze!
Stay tuned for the next post on our Worm Composting bin and our Garden Party Court of Awards Ceremony!
*Images used in this post were created and are property of 3 Wittle Birds. Permission must be first granted along with a link back to our website before use of images. Thank you.
The Best Websites to Follow if You are a Troop Leader
Welcome Troop Leader Mamas!!
Because sharing is caring, today I wanted to share with you my favorite websites for my meeting planning inspiration that I think will be of great help to you! When I first started out planning the meetings I was overwhelmed with all the different resources and felt lost. I followed the Girls Guide to Girl Scouting and the Journey Leadership books, but I felt there was more needed. Some of the activities didn't fit our troop dynamic and I needed to make some changes.
This is totally okay!!
You really need to think of your troop atmosphere and what would actually work with Your girls because sometimes following the leadership manual or Girl Guide activities doesn't engage your specific girl group. I will write a post on the importance of this later but you need to keep this in mind.
Another great resource is your council and other councils. If you search different councils you will find they offer different resources and badge planning. So, if you don't like what your council has to offer find one you do like!
Best Websites for Troop Planning....
Making Friends
This website offers free and very cute printables such as calendars and coloring pages! It's also a store where you can purchase activities for your girls or get inspiration.
OCD GS
Another fellow troop leader offering up their ideas and troop meeting planning and badge earning.
One Year of Daisy Scouts
Ideas of badge earning and journey in a day!
Scout Leader Connect
Troop meeting planning ideas and inspiration. I love her egg breaking idea for "Be courageous and strong"
Girl Scout Leader 101
More badge and awards planning.
In the Loop
A helpful blog from troop support itself!
I'm sure you already know this!
Hope this helps ya'll out!!! If you have a website or blog dedicated to Girl Scouts please share with us in the comments! I would love to create a forum of resources! Have a wonderful Monday!
Why You Should be a Girl Scouts Troop Leader
Hey everyone!!!
Today I wanted to talk about a topic of what it means to be a Girl Scout volunteer and how it's such a crucial role in these young girls lives. For those of you who are following along but are not a volunteer, this post is for you! Have you been approached about this opportunity, either through a membership specialist or previous troop leader? Are you currently debating whether this role is for you? I promise you, it is! Let me start off by telling you how it began with me....
Behind this online world, I'm actually an introverted person. I generally don't like large groups of people and new social situations make me anxious. It's not that I'm anti social, it's just how I'm made. Frankly, I'm proud of it and I'm comfortable with who I am.
The idea of being a troop leader seemed quite impossible to me but, after the membership specialist told me there was no troop at my daughter's school but recommended myself volunteering, I didn't shoot the idea down right away.
It took me a while to make the decision but I thought back to the reasons why I wanted Bella to join Girl Scouts...
- I really wanted her to take part in this program and gain the confidence
- Open her up to new experiences
- My daughter is a little shy (wonder where she gets it from) and I wanted her to come out of her shell a little
- Lasting and healthy friendships
So I decided to take on the challenge for my daughter. I wanted to show her that if I can come out of my shell and do something out of my comfort zone, then she can too. After all, we are our daughter's first example of a strong and confident women.
I didn't realize when I made this decision how much it would not only impact my daughter but how much it would impact myself.
- I gained leaderships skills that I didn't even know I had.
- My daughter has made massive strides in character development and self-confidence.
- I got to make a difference in 11 other girls lives in the community!
It's only been a year but I love being a troop leader! I love setting an example and providing a wonderful opportunity to these girls. Our girls are the future of this world! If you are considering possibly being a volunteer, I encourage you to take the leap and try it out for just one year. If I can do it, anyone can do it! SERIOUSLY!