Remembrance Sunday Parade

Our Beavers, Cubs, Scouts along with the Brownies and Guides, today paid respect to those who have been killed in wars, by parading round Porthill, led by our drum band and then by joining the congregation of St. Andrew’s Church for a service of Remembrance.

The Scout Group’s drum band was restarted this year by our Assistant Scout Leader after a gap of around 50 years!

Last year marked the first time in over 20 years that the Scouts and Guides paraded from St. Andrew’s Church Hall to the Church and this year they took a slightly longer route around the streets of Porthill.

It’s very pleasing to show to the general public that the members of the Scouts and Guides of Porthill have come out to show their respect to those who have been killed in wars. I’m also proud of the skill and dedication of the members of the drum band who only reformed at the beginning of this year and are now skilled and confident enough to lead a parade through the streets of Porthill.

 

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I’d invited our local MP and a number of local Borough and County Councillors to come along and see us parading. Only one councillor made it, the others were either at other ceremonies (fair enough) or didn’t bother to reply to me (tut tut).

I’m very grateful to Staffs Police for making sure the roads were safe for us to parade along!

More photos are available in the Scout Group’s gallery here.

11-11-11 Rememberance Day

Today at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of the 11th year it is 93 years since the end of the First World War and 97 years since its beginning.

Did the War to End All War’s do so? No. But we continue to honour those who died in the service of their countries from that time to, sadly, the present day.

The poem below contains the famous words of remembrance, and although it concerns itself with England (sometimes used erroneously instead of the UK), whichever country you come from, you can make a substitution.

For The Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old,
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England’s foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

LAURENCE BINYON 1914

Porthill Scouts Killed in World War 1 and World War 2

We will remember them

An Apology!

For those of you who wander by here from time to time, you’ll have noticed I’ve been a bit quiet recently. My Scouting has taken a bit of a back seat as we’ve been preparing for the arrival of our second daughter.

Laura Lily Wood was born on Friday last week and is a very health little girl.

So as is to be expected other things are occupying my time at the moment (she’s having her morning snooze at the moment!). So even though posts will be a little sparse for a while, I do have a couple of interesting things coming up in the next few weeks which I will be sharing with you all.

Canvas Versus Modern Tents

For our first discussion, Chris and I talk about the merits (or otherwise) of traditional canvas tents versus modern synthetic ones.

Traditional Canvas Tents – Nick

Canvas tents have been around since the dawn of Scouting, so much so that when people think of Scouts camping, the mental image is of Scouts standing round a green patrol tent wearing their traditional ‘lemon squeezer’ hats!

Some Scouts camping last weekend – possibly!

However, despite their ‘old fashioned’ image, canvas tents, especially of the patrol or Icelandic type, do have their place in modern Scouting.

Although a canvas tent would never be used these days in conjunction with hiking (too heavy), they are extremely useful for a ‘static’ camp – weekend or week.

Firstly they are, when done correctly, quick and easy to put up. There is no messing around working out which pole goes in which hole with which colour! An experienced patrol can erect one in around 15 minutes.

Secondly, is their extreme durability. A correctly pitched patrol tent with a fly sheet can be as close to bone dry as is possible while camping. Also these tents can be a lot more sturdy in extremes of weather. For example, a couple of years back we took the Scouts camping around Easter. This was in mid March and we’d had snow forecast and overnight it did. The following morning, the leaders awoke to part of our modern tent on our faces! The weight of the snow had pushed it down on top of us. The Scouts who were in their patrol tent, didn’t realise it had snowed until they left their tent (at which point the snow balls started flying!).

A canvas tent, if looked after and stored properly, will last for years. In fact, my Group still has the patrol tents we bought in 1983! They have been repaired a number of times and are still usable (although to be fair, I wouldn’t use them without a fly these days). I would be impressed if a modern dome or tunnel tent would last over 5 years.

Finally, the patrol tent encourages a patrol to actually camp together and bond as a patrol unit. In a dome or tunnel tent, people sleep in pods or sections isolated from each other where as in a patrol tent the entire patrol of 6 or 8 (at a push) sleep in a 14’ tent. Of course the other advantage of a patrol tent is that you can stand up in them!

Although not a canvas tent as such, one of the other iconic tents is a Vango Force 10 and when I need a tent for myself when camping, this is the one I always make a beeline for!

In conclusion, the canvas tent should still be regarded as an essential for camping within Scouting and should not be dismissed because they are ‘old fashioned’.

Modern Synthetic Tents – Chris

Some very good points have been made by Nick for the good old style of canvas camping however my first counter to Nick is to say, we as Scouts are now co-educational and the single room canvas tent does not allow the modern patrol to camp together as a patrol, unless your patrol is all girl or all boy.

A selection of modern tents.

If you have a pod style tent where the central dome has 3 rooms off it then you can sleep up to 9 Scouts in groups of threes and you can allow the mixed patrol to stay camp and sleep as a patrol. Boys and girls have their own space to sleep and change, but still feel as though they are camping as a patrol. This can also over come the potentially serious problem of the patrol that has one girl that comes to camp. With a traditional tent the boys all go in to the tent and the girl goes in a 1 person tent next to the boys, is that safe to have one girl sleeping on her own?

My second argument is around at management storage putting up etc. I have put up both canvas and modern tents and I believe a good patrol with put up both in about the same time. However, when it is blowing a hoolie on that campsite you have picked over looking the beach at Barmouth and the two 11 year old Scouts holding the main poles of your Icelandic tent turn to put it in position and the wind catches that sail they have made, the comedy value is great. The safety aspect of dislocated shoulders and poles on heads is never fun.

Thirdly, there is nothing better than coming back from camp to be able to go home pour a beer put your feet up and sink into your favourite chair. Oh wait, it was raining when we struck camp so out comes the tent and quickly throw it over the washing line – hey presto, by the end of the evening it is dry as a bone and ready to be packed away for next time. The drenched canvas  tent will still be handing in the Scout Hut (if you have the room) or in your garage for weeks while you try and get that canvas dry.

Finally, my final case for modern tents comes in the form of space. Most canvas tent will have a canvas bag, pole bag, maybe a peg and mallet bag – if you’re lucky and have plenty of time you will get the canvas, pegs and mallet in the valise, but the poles will always be separate, and the weight of the valise when the canvas is packed tight it considerable. Scouts will struggle to lift it, Cubs don’t have a chance and Beavers, well we won’t go there! Thus transport to camp requires  someone to have a van or a people carrier and adult manpower to do the humping and shifting. With modern tents, two Scouts or four Cubs will easily lift the bag and it will fit in the boot of a standard family car. The benefit of this linked to my third point, is you can asks parents to take the wet tent home hang it on the washing line and bring it to Scouts the following week.

We’ve made our arguments both for and against canvas and modern tents, so why don’t you join the debate and tell us which is your preference and why in the comments? We look forward to reading what you have to say.

Nick & Chris

Discussions

After I’d had a chat last week with Chris Meadows (see his blog here or follow him on Twitter here), he came up with a rather interesting proposal. We would pick a topic and one of us would argue one side and the other one the opposite. One of us would then edit the arguments and put them on his blog with a link to the discussion from the other’s blog.

The interesting part about all this is that while we can make opposing arguments on a topic, we may not actually believe that position! This can make for some interesting and thought provoking points being made. On the other hand we may believe exactly what we’re saying! The fun thing is to see if we mean what we say!

The first discussion about canvas tents versus modern synthetic tents will be posted here soon, so watch this space.

September

The holidays are over, the nights are drawing in and life begins to get busy again on the Scouting front. The Scouts are camping this weekend, it’s Harvest at church next weekend and the Cubs are camping next month to name but a few things we have on.

I always find it interesting that after the lull of the summer, we always come back with such a busy programme for the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts. So plenty will be going on for the rest of the year for the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts and I’ll let you know what my Group is getting up to!

First Class Scout

My uncle recently sent me a box of stuff which included a couple of Scouting related books – ‘Gilcraft’s First Class Book’ and ‘How to Pass First Class Tests’.

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These books were written in 1945 and 1959 respectively (these were actually printed in 1960) and are to help the Scout pass his First Class Badge. The first requisite to obtaining the First Class Badge was to have already gained the Second Class Badge. Once the Frist Class Badge was gained then the Scout could begin work on the King’s / Queen’s Scout Award (depending if they did it pre 1952 or not).

Reading through the books it is quite obvious how different they are to todays badges. Firstly, the rules regarding passing each section were very strict. For example –

The District Commissioner may allow a Scout to gain the First Class badge without passing the Swimming test, provided he is satisfied that it is not practicable for the Scout to obtain the facilities for learning to swim, and that the Scout gains the alternative badge as in the case of those holding a doctor’s certificate.

So no leeway there then!

Reading the first aid section is quite interesting. The way the methods of providing first aid have changed quite considerably in the last 50 years or so.

There is also a rather unhealthy interest in recognise different species of bird. I’m fairly sure I would have had difficulty with this one!

These book are most interesting and show the way the Scouts of the past gained their badges.

World Scout Jamboree

I’ve been meaning to write about a few things over the last few days, but haven’t got round to it. However, if you’re interested in the World Scout Jamboree in Sweden, please take a look at my Group’s site where one of our Young Leaders is posting updates and pictures from the WSJ!

Busy, Busy, Busy!

Although if you’ve been looking here recently, you wouldn’t have thought so!

The last couple of weeks have had me smoothing a lot of ruffled feathers in the Group and sorting a big problem out due to some ‘misunderstandings’ with another party. I’m sure you can tell that I’m being awfully vague here as it’s not something I can really go into, but needless to say a lot of evenings the other week were spent in front of the keyboard and on the telephone! It’s all sorted now and everyone’s happy. Oh the joys of being a Group Scout Leader!

Then this last weekend I’ve been out camping with the Cubs. We had a great time and the weather was actually nice, after the rain on the Friday evening of course!

One of the things the Cubs did, which I’ve never actually seen before, was crate stacking. This involves standing on crates, adding more to the stack and trying to stand on as many crates and go as high as possible without falling off. Of course, the Cubs are attached to ropes so that when they do fall off, they don’t just hit the ground!

Two of our Cubs actually broke the site record for the most crates stacked by Cubs!

Here is a little video I made from the photos I took.

At one point our Young Leader who is attending the 22nd World Scout Jamboree in Sweden was going to come out, but unfortunately, he wasn’t able to make it. However, as the camp site has three flagpoles, in honour of the Jamboree, I put up a Swedish flag.

 

I have to say that I’m somewhat jealous of those attending the Jamboree, but I’m sure they’ll all have a brilliant time!

Group Annual General Meeting

Friday saw my group’s Annual General Meeting. This is where everyone connected with the Group gets to see what each section has been up to over the last year and also to do the ‘formal’ stuff, approve the year’s accounts and elect the members of the Group’s Executive.

Each of the section Leaders write a report to highlight the activities the Beavers, Cubs and Scouts have done over the last 12 months. As Group Scout Leader, I also have to do a report. However, after looking at a few of my past years efforts, I realised that a certain amount was just repeating what the section Leaders had already said. Boring!

So I decided to show everyone what we’d done and made a video of the pictures that had been taken at our events.

My 2011 GSL’s Report

Everyone seemed enjoy it and thought it was a good way to show off the activities we’d done over the past 12 months.

Trouble is I’m going to have to top that next year! I’d better start planning now……

Beaver ‘Camp’

Last weekend I went to camp for my first full weekend with our Beavers. I’ve visited them while at camp before, but never stayed for the whole time.

Now I have to mention here that I wasn’t in ‘full Leader’ mode as such while we were there, as Carol and Rachael (wife & daughter) were there as well, so a lot of my time was spent chasing after an 18 month old little girl who was enjoying being out in the open and playing in the mud and puddles! The other Leaders knew it was going to be like this!

We all went out on the Friday evening to prepare and the Beavers came out on the Saturday morning.

Beavers are only allowed to stay away from home for one night, which is why they came out on Saturday. They can now sleep under canvas, but it was decided that it’s much easier for them to stay in a building – they are only 6 – 8 years old!

The theme for the camp was ‘under the sea’ so the Beavers had fun with all things water based (luckily it had stopped raining by this point!).

Of course, we had a campfire which was great fun.

The thing to bear in mind with a Beaver camp is that there is virtually no downtime for the Leaders. There are things going on all the time and the Beavers must be kept occupied while they are awake! This could well be the first time they are away from Mum and Dad and not with family members so there is the possibility they could get homesick. So the fact the kids are only at camp for two days is quite enough for Leaders. Having said that, EVERYONE on the camp had a brilliant time and really enjoyed themselves. This is of course down to the dedication of the Leaders and the huge amount of planning by the Beaver Leader.

As a personal aside, we bought Rachael a pop up tent with tiger stripes for her to play in (first tent I’ve ever bought!) and she loved it. Not too long before she can sleep in it, rain permitting, I think!

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Twitter

This week I’ve participated in two different uses of Twitter. First of all I was blamed by Scouter Jeff for his recent higher than normal tea consumption! My English influence reaching all the way to California apparently! This then descended into national stereotypes of me  preferring tea and more of my American friends preferring coffee (why is coffee called Joe by the way?), until Shawn and Scouter Liberty mentioned iced tea. Now as any normal person (i.e. English!) knows, iced tea is just wrong!

Anyway the point being that we all had some fun and there was some general silliness going on over long distances!

Then today came another. I read in our local paper last night about one of my District’s Groups trying to raise enough money to buy the old church they meet in. So today I’ve put the story on the District website and sent out a message on the District’s Twitter account. I’ve then retweeted the message through my Group’s account and my own (these multiple personalities can get confusing!).

This evening I received a tweet from another local youth group asking for the Scout Group’s contact details as the youth group might be able to offer some help. I’ve passed details on, and I  don’t know if anything will become of the contact, but at least their message is getting ‘out into the wild’ so to speak.

I really do hope that the Group raise enough money to buy their old church and hopefully tweeting about it may have made some difference!

One silly use of Twitter and a potentially useful one to a Group raising money. Social media can be great, if used correctly, for helping people so if you know of something worthwhile,  tweet your friends!

A Monkey Emails

Seriously! Last night I got an email from Augustus Clibbon  who is a monkey and the mascot of the 3rd Ware Scout Group from Hertfordshire. This is the Group whose Scouts produced the video on how to tie a friendship knot which is very popular on my Group’s site.

Augustus appears to be a well travelled monkey and goes to a lot of the events his Group runs. He even has his own blog and website! All very impressive for a monkey. Perhaps he could get together with Buttons the Radical Boy Scout to present a joint podcast!

It’s also good to read that his Group is celebrating its centenary this year, so happy birthday to them!