Faith, 29/10/10

Chat about the faith badge
Game:  True / False
Label one wall ‘true’ the other ‘false’
Call out:
Banana (true) Hen (false)
Sun (true)  Sky (false)
Daffodil (true) Tomato (false)
Buttercup (true) Iris (false)
Pig (false)  Butter (true)
Grapes (false) Lemon (true)
Flour (false)  Baby chick (true)
And the Beaver Scouts have to run to the wall that they think is correct (yellow objects)

Craft: Cakes
Buy or make some small cakes
Let the Beaver Scouts ice them with yellow icing and decorate with yellow sweets

Game: Raindrops and Puddles
Cut puddles out of old paper and number (one for each Beaver Scouts)
The Beaver Scouts run around being raindrops and when the leader shouts ‘rain’ they go and stand in a puddle.
The leader calls out a number - if that is the number on their puddle they sit down.

Craft - Cloud Mobile
Cut out cloud from card - one per Beaver Scouts
Cut out 3 rain drops per Beaver Scouts
Let the Beaver Scouts colour in the raindrops and cover the cloud with cotton wool (watch out for allergies)
Fasten each raindrop onto a short piece of string and attach to the bottom of the cloud.
Make a hole in the top of the cloud and make a loop with which to hang the cloud.
If you are brave the Beaver Scouts can add glitter to their rain drops!

A Good Turn

Why does Scouting encourage a boy to do Good Turns? Here is what Lord Baden-Powell, Scouting’s founder, had to say about it: “The Scouting practices tend in a practical way to educate the boy out of the groove of selfishness. Once he becomes charitable, he is well on the way to overcome or to eradicate the danger of this habit.” The promise that a Scout makes on joining has as its first point, “To do my duty to God.” Note that it does not say, “To be loyal to God,” since that would merely be a state of mind. It clearly says to do something, which is the positive, active attitude.

Baden-Powell went on to say, “The main method of the Boy Scouts movement is to give some form of positive training rather than merely to inculcate negative precepts, since the boy is always ready to do rather than to digest. Therefore, we put into his activities the practice of Good Turns in his daily life as a foundation of future goodwill and helpfulness to others. The religious basis underlying this is common to all denominations, and we, therefore, interface with the form of none.

“Thus we teach him that to do his duty to God means, not merely to lean on his kindness, but to do his will by practicing love toward one’s neighbour.”

Fruit and Vegetables, 22/10/10

Guess the names
Have lots of pictures of fruit and vegetables around the room. The Beavers have to name them

Chat about fruit and vegetables

Game:  Where they grow
The Beavers have to decide where certain fruit / vegetables grow
Name 3 corners of the room as: Trees, Underground, On the ground
The leader calls out a particular name e.g. Apple
The Beavers have to run to the corner that they think is correct.

Craft: Potato printing
Let the Beavers make a print from a potato. The Beavers then use their print (or they can share each others) to make a picture of fruit (growing on a tree) or vegetables

Game: Fruit Run
The Beavers sit in a circle and are given the name of a fruit in rotation. One Beavers is selected to stand in the centre. When the leader shouts the name of a fruit the Beavers have to swap places - with the Beavers in the centre trying to get a seat.
If the leader calls ‘fruit salad’ all the Beavers swap places.

Skill: What is it
Run two bases:
Beavers have to name a fruit / vegetable by taste (carrot, apple etc.)
Beavers have to name a fruit / vegetable by smell (lemon, onion etc)
For all the food we enjoy, Thankyou God.
For frozen peas, fish and chips
From the freezers at the shops
Apples, pears and oranges
Part of all the farmer’s crops
Thank you God. Amen

Ships, 15/10/10

Matches on bottle 
Plastic medicine bottles and spent matches or small sticks.
Object - to balance as many sticks on bottle as possible in a given time. Any that fall off should be left. Each Beavers may only place one stick at a time.

Game:  Islands
Give each Beavers a piece of A4 paper on which is drawn something to do with dads:
Eg: Slippers    Hat        Spade        Tool box
These can be repeated for more than one Beavers
Place the paper face down on the floor. The Beavers run around and when the whistle blows they have to stand on a piece of paper. The leader calls out an object - if this is on their piece of paper the Beavers is ‘out’

Craft: Create a card
Fold a small paper plate in half
The Beavers can write a message inside.
On the outside, write, "I'd sail the seven seas for you!"
Have the Beavers cut a long strip of black construction paper (or use a lolly stick) for the mast
Make the sails one of two ways:
make a two fingerpaint handprints on contrasting coloured paper. Cut out a rough triangle shape around the handprints
or trace two hands onto a piece of paper. Cut out and glue to a contrasting triangle of paper

Game: Keeper of the keys
Equip - Blindfold + Bunch of keys.
Object - to collect keys without being heard by the keeper.

Game: Simon says  
Leader does an action and tells Beavers to do it. Beavers do it only if leader says "Simon says...[do this]...".
If leader only says "...[Do this].." and Beavers do it, they are out.

Pearls of Wisdom—Quotes from Baden-Powell

Try to leave this world a little better than you found it and, when your turn comes to die, you can die happy in feeling that at any rate you have not wasted your time but have done your best

Families, 08/10/10

Matching game
Let the Beavers match the parent animal to the baby
Cow: calf
Horse : pony
Pig : piglet
Cat : kitten
Hen : chick
Dog : pup
Beaver : kit
Fox : cub
Kangaroo : Joey
Elephant : calf

Chat about families (remember not all your Beavers will have 2 parents living together)

Game: Royal family jigsaw
Colour copy a large picture of the royal family - stick onto card and then cutup (as a jigsaw)
In relay fashion – see which team makes it up quickest

Craft: Family tree
Draw a tree (no leaves) onto A4 paper and copy one for each Beavers
Copy a number of leaves (large enough to take a name and a small picture)
Let the Beavers colour in the tree and add their family members as leaves. Remember their pets!

Game: Happy families game
Using a pack of cards
Give each Beavers a card and they have to find the rest of their family

Mime: Once in their families (in the game above) - let the Beavers mime the ‘trade’ of the family and have the other Beavers guess what it is.

Frogs, 01/10/10

Hopping Relay races

Indoors or our doors - set up a simple obstacle course - and let the Beavers have a go in teams.

Include a long jump and record the teams jumps to see which team can jump the furthest

Chat about Frogs

Leap Frog

Divide the Beavers into groups and show them how to 'leap frog' - have a race!

Frog Relay

Divide the Beavers into teams.

Given each team a ball or balloon to place between their knees and in turn the Beavers walk up the hall and back without dropping the ball

Frog mask

Using a paper plate design a frog face mask

Racing Frogs

Make a template of  a flattened out frog shape and let the Beavers draw round it in card and colour in. 

Then help them to cut the shapes out. 

Stick an old pop bottle top  to the underside of the frog 

Using a large marble and a trestle table propped up at one end to make it slope - have some races.

Game:  Lily Pad relay

Lodges stand in relay formation. Each lodge is given a circle of paper (one less than the number of Beavers in the lodge). They have to make their way to the other end of the room using the circles as stepping stones.

Craft: Frog catchers

The Beavers all have a small paper plate. They colour the underside green and the top side pink. Then fold the plate in ½ and add ‘googly’ eyes (or circles of white paper instead).

The Beavers then stamp out a butterfly (if you don’t have a rubber stamp to do this draw one for each child). Colour it in and cut it out. Then attach to a piece of wool and stick into the frogs mouth.

See who can make their frog catch the butterfly!

Game:  Hopping Relay

Usual relay rules. The Beavers have to hop like frogs up and down the rule. You could repeat with the Beavers hopping in different ways.

Caterpillars, 24/09/10

Catch the Caterpillar

Beavers stand in a circle and a rolled up newspaper is the caterpillar.

One Beavers is outside the circle, running round trying to catch the branch which is being passed round the circle.

When the Beavers catches the caterpillar he joins the circle and another Beavers takes his place.

Apple and Caterpillar Magnet

Materials Needed:

·         Lid (Frozen Juice Container, Baby Food Jar, etc)

·         Red felt

·         Green Felt

·         Brown and Green Pipe Cleaners

·         Tacky Glue or Super Glue

·         Magnet

Instructions:
1. Trace a circle around the lid on the red felt and cut it out.

2. Glue the red circle onto the lid. If you are using a baby food jar lid or something similar, glue the circle to the inside of the lid.

3. Cut out small leaf shapes from the green felt. You want it to look like 2 leaves attached in the middle. A leader should make a small hole in the middle of the leaf shape.

4. Cut a small piece of a green pipe cleaner to be the stem (1-2 inches long).

5. Stick the end of the pipe cleaner through the hole in the middle of the leaf.

6. Using heavy duty glue, or even strong tape, attach one end of the pipe cleaner to the side of the lid without the felt. You will also want to glue the magnet on the back now.

7. For a finishing touch, cut a 2-3 inch long piece of brown chenille stem and glue that on the front of your apple to be a worm poking his head out! Glue wiggly eyes on your worm if you like! Make sure to lay it flat until the glue is completely dry, and then hang on the fridge!

Caterpillar Trail

Divide the Beavers into teams. Each grasps the waits of the Beavers in front

The Head (1^st in team) has to catch the tail (last in team) by dragging everyone with him - but the tail tries not to get caught. Anyone who lets go breaks the chain and must become the tail.

If the head touches the tail they both exchange places with other Beavers in the team so everyone had a go at being head or tail

The New Scout

There was a boy named Jim who moved into town just after his 11th birthday. For a long time he had dreamed about becoming a Scout. Jim was a bit timid, perhaps too much so. He didn’t push himself into things but usually waited for an invitation.

Well, one night Jim came down to visit our troop meeting. He looked in through the window and saw us playing and heard our voices. But he couldn’t quite force himself to come down those steps. Now don’t smile too broadly. It wasn’t so very long ago that you might have been in Jim’s place. Maybe you were inclined to be timid, too.

Jim waited around awhile and went home, without getting his nerve up to the coming-in point. He was pretty miserable about his failure, but he came back a

week later. He waited outside the door again. He just couldn’t force himself to come in uninvited. Finally he saw a Scout coming down the street, heading for the meeting.

That Scout was you. Now, that’s the entire story I’m going to tell you tonight. What happened? Did you brush by him or did you invite him to come in?

Back to Front, 17/09/10

Chat: Explain to the Beaver Scout (who may have forgotten what is going on in the meeting – that everything is being done back to front – or just wrongly!)

Prayer and Close

Game: Traffic Lights

The Beavers walk around the room.

The leader holds up coloured cards to control the traffic – red = go, green = stop, amber = slow movement

Don’t forget to add traffic noises

Game: Lego matching

Give each team a model made from about 25 Lego bricks.

Can they take the model to pieces, then make another one?

Craft: Jigsaws

Find a number of pictures

Print or stick onto card.

The Beaver Scout have to colour in the card and then cut it up – they are making jigsaws – but don’t tell them that at first!

Game: Run, as slow as you can

The Beaver Scouts sit in relay formation

Prepare pictures of 6 or 7 things for each team - these should have a sequence - eg: to make a cup of tea : Kettle, water, tea pot, tea bag, cup, milk, + sugar

Place these in order in front of each team.

On the word ‘go’, player one must walk to the far end of the hall, taking the last picture and then return to their team.

Player two takes the next to last picture and walks to the end of the hall placing it next to the 1^st card and so one.

See who finishes last!

Opening ceremony