frustrated

[michael whitehurst]

:confused: I'm a den leader with five well rounded tiger cubs. The problem I'm having is that only one or two kids come to the bi-weekly meeting,but everyone shows up for the pack meeting. I want my son to have fun but when only two show it makes it hard to do the activities I,ve planned.I,m thinking of pulling my son out and put him in a differant pack,please help....some advise?

[CommissionerTim]

Hi Michael,

I understand your dilema, however, I feel you're trying to provide something that the others cannot attend because of their committments to other activities and family. You will find that a majority of Cub Scout Packs only meet once a week... this includes den meetings. So in a calendar month, you will have 3 den meetings and 1 pack meeting... with the exception of that one or two months in the year that have 5 weeks in the month. Families simply do not have the time to meet twice a week... unless their lives is solely focused on scouting, you will not see it happen.

I suggest you cut your meetings to once a week with one pack meeting a month and one outing per month as a pack, your den can have an outing every week if you'd like so long as the boys fulfill some requirements for his advancement. Keep with the cub scout motto -- Do your best! -- And your scouts will do their best.

I've mentioned this before and I'll say it again and again... if you're not trained in your leadership, I suggest you get training soon. In the meantime, checkout http://olc.scouting.org and take the training you haven't done yet.

Good luck and let us know how it's going.

[A J Mako]

In addition to Tim's comments, I would suggest reaching out to the parents of the other members of the den. Find out why they don't show. It could be you have too many meetings. It could be the meetings do not fit their schedule. It could also be that they just never got the word.

Participation in any Scouting activity depends on two primary factors:

1) Interest: The Scout, and his parents, have to be interested in participating in the activity. That means the activity must be sold and they have to know about it. If they aren't interested, they probably won't attend. If the are interested, they'll find a way to fit it in their schedule.

2) Scheduling: The activity has to fit into the Scout's, and/or his parents', schedules. This is especially true when you're just starting out and you need Scouts to attend to build interest. I'm not saying you have to schedule events so there is absolutely no chance of conflict--that's impossible. With a small group, though, it's easier to find ways to accommodate everyone's schedule. Until you can build interest, anything that conflicts with anything in a Scout's schedule will be ignored.

[Scouter_58]

Participation in any Scouting activity depends on two primary factors:

1) Interest:
2) Scheduling:

May I also highlight the emphasis on Communication, clear, consistent, constant, timely, and perhaps foremost, because without it neither the interest nor scheduling factors can be sustained.

Scouter_58

[Nuts4Scouts]

Um - fellows, I think you need a brush up on your vocab. Bi-weekly means every OTHER week, not 2X a week.

Mike - Your Tigers need to be meeting EVERY WEEK, whenever possible. I REALLY hate bi-weekly meetings, especially for brand new Cubs. It can get very confusing. If they don't cover their calendars in notes (which many do not!), they are always asking "do we meet this week, next week, or when???".

The next thing you should do is call the other families & find out if they have any specific reasons (other than confusion) for not coming to meetings. Maybe they are all in basketball & the games are at the same time as the Tiger meetings. Find out if a different day/time would work better for them. Be FLEXABLE. If the problem is sports, maybe changing your day/time for a month or 2 might help.

You mentioned that you are doing all of the activity planning. Tigers are run using SHARED LEADERSHIP. That means that ALL of the Tiger Teams should be taking turns running meetings. If the no-shows were given responsibility for a week's meeting it would give them a reason to be there.

As I said before - be FLEXABLE. Bring along some alternate activities every week, even if one of the other Tiger Teams is running the meeting. Everyone runs into activities that go to fast, to slow or bomb altogether. Have some stuff on hand that will work if only a few Teams show up. Balloons are great for cheap, easy, instant game materials! Some action songs like "Cub Scout Feeling", "Grand Old Duke of York", & the monkey version of "If You're Happy & You Know It (scratch side/jump up & down/say ooh-ooh/all 3) are all great fun for any number of folks!

Do you notice I have been mentioning Tiger TEAMS? The Tiger & his Adult Partner make up a TEAM that should be doing ALL of the Tiger activities TOGETHER. Even if there are only 2 boys there, you have 4 people. There is a lot you can do with 4 people! Yes, it would be more lively with all 10 Team members in attendance, but it can still be fun with less.

[CommissionerTim]

bi-weekly actually has two meanings... http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bi-weekly

It could mean every two weeks in the month or mean twice weekly... so before we start arguing about the terminology of someone's wording... please ask them or look up the word in the dictionary.

So Michael, what is your true meaning of "bi-weekly"? Are you holding meetings twice a week or once every other week?

[michael whitehurst]

I guess I should have said ever other month. I'm sorry about all the incorrect english,multi-tasking is not my strong suit.I originally wanted to have our cubs meet every week but most parents dissagreed.The next thing was I wanted to share the leadership but that was like pulling teeth.I'm the only parent in the group that was a scout,so they all look to me for activities and camping trips or leadership.I planned a trip to the fire dept. and police house,but when only two kids ,one other parent show up it's a little hard not to be frustrated. Two of our kids earned there Tiger badge at the Blue and Gold banquet. The other parents wanted to know when we were going to make up some of the "go see its".I don't have time to go back to these places,but I want the kids to earn there badges.
I thank everyone for there input on this matter. I hope now that spring is here and camping is on everyones mind things will change. p.s. Since this is my first time leading very young kids instead of older boys,do you think it would be to soon to show them some basic survival skills like starting a fire without matches the three main skills of fire shelter and water?

[Nuts4Scouts]

do you think it would be to soon to show them some basic survival skills like starting a fire without matches the three main skills of fire shelter and water?

YES! Way to soon! Tigers can not camp without their families AND the rest of the Pack, much less start fires! Have you taken all of your leader training?

Michael, part of your problem is you are letting the other parents make up their own program as they go along. You should be meeting every week, if some parents can not make a meeting then they miss out on what was done. It is a lot harder to fit in all of the needed den activities & field trips when you are meeting so seldom. If a parent asks you about make-ups for Go-See-It's, make them responsible for setting one up. Send out e-mail reminders or snail mail newsletters, or both. Parents can even do the Go-See-It's & Den activities on there own if they have no other option. In the end, you can not earn the badge for them. It is something that the boys & their families do together.

One question - All of the boys have earned their Bobcat badge, right? With meeting so seldom & all of your problems getting families to attend, how did you manage to get them to complete their Bobcat?

[A J Mako]

Scouter_58:
The only reason I didn't mention communication is because I view that as part of generating interest. In fact, it's the first step in generating interest. If you don't communicate the campout, no one will be interested in going.

On the other hand communication is also pretty important to scheduling. I mean, what good is a calendar if no one knows about it? How do you even make a calanedar without asking for input? So I have to agree.

Participation in any Scouting activity depends on three primary factors:
1) Communication
2) Interest
3) Scheduling

[A J Mako]

Michael,
I agree with Nuts4Scouts on the basic "survival" skills and pretty much everything else he said.

What I think most of us are trying to suggest is that you need to establish den meetings. It takes a little time for people to get into a routine, so you need to set a firm day, time and place for den meetings and stick to it. You need to develop and communicate the program--the list of basic topics for each meeting. And you need to keep pushing the program every chance you get.

One way you can develop interest is to set up an email list for your den. Send out an email reminder a day or two before the den meeting and include the program plan so no one can complain they didn't know about it. After the meeting send out another email explaining what was accomplished during the meeting--note specific requirements completed and list the boys who completed them. With a little luck the folks who don't show up will start to see what their son is missing and make more of an effort.

Do not mention in your emails the boys who don't show up or the boys who aren't advancing. All that will do is make people angry. And when parents ask you about making up things that are missed, be friendly and courteous and give them the contacts or resources you used. Help them set it up, show them how to set it up, but don't stop the den program just to go back and catch some boys up.

The key is to eliminate as many excuses as you can. Anything under your control they use as an excuse not to participate, find a way to eliminate it. Establish consistency--den meetings are every week on this day at this time in this place. Communicate everything as often and as clearly as you can. If you need help, ask the other parents in the den for specific help. Don't make it a general, global announcement. Ask individuals individually. If you can, give each team a specific responsiblity for each meeting that doesn't require a lot of time and effort--once they realize helping isn't as hard as they thought it would be, they should be more willing to accept a little bigger job.