Getting Started with Brownies Part Three -- Agenda

For our first year of Brownies, I've got the (loose) dates set up for meetings .

The plan is to meet the first and third Friday of each month, for an hour and 15 minutes right after school. Having meetings last this long allows us to have time for two activities/games, a snack, and includes time for the Pledge, Promise, Law, etc. We often have time left over, even, to go out and play (which all the girls love, of course!).

The first year we will be focusing on Legacy and Cookie-related badges. For those of you who are looking for information on Brownie Journey badges, you'll have to head on over to Google and Pinterest. We're not planning on incorporating Journeys this year. That's next year's agenda. Maybe. However, I will be posting details on each badge we're working on here as we go, and you may find some activities that you could use towards a Journey (I hope!).

Given our meeting days (based upon our school year, and taking into account vacation/holiday time) here's our agenda plan:

Meeting 1 - Welcome and Intro to Brownies
Meeting 2 - Brownie GS Way
Meeting 3 - Brownie GS Way contd.
Meeting 4 - Painting
Meeting 5 - Brownie First Aid
Meeting 6 - Celebrating Community (for us, this hits in December, a great time to focus on community)
Meeting 7 - Snacks
Meeting 8 - Intro to Cookie Sales
Meeting 9 - Cookies Meet My Customer
Meeting 10 - Fair Play
Meeting 11 - Cookies Financial Literacy
Meeting 12 - Bugs
Meeting 13 - Catch Up/Bonus Day for whatever we need to catch up on
Meeting 14 - Last meeting of the year - Review and Fun!

Non-Meeting - End-of-the-Year Party/Ceremony

You are allowed to earn one Financial Literacy and one Cookie Business badge per year.

EDIT: Some leaders prefer to have the girls create the agenda from the get-go, first year of Brownies. I did talk to the girls about which badges they wanted to work on (they really wanted to do Painting -- so much so that it would've required at least two meetings, and we had too many snow days to include it, so we're saving it for year two), but there were some badges I felt were important, foundational ones that we really needed to include (GS Way, First Aid, Community, etc.). Plus, I had to schedule visitors far in advance, so the badges that had an outside expert come in had to be pretty well set in stone.

We ended up booting Fair Play in favor of camp-themed activities instead. This was the girls' choice.

As always, you do what works best for your troop. This is just basically a sample of how to set up a rough itinerary for the school year. In year two, the girls will be determining the agenda and which badges/patches we work on. Give them as much opportunity for leadership/input as possible, while keeping it age- and troop-appropriate. You know your girls better than some other leader would. So you do what's best for your troop. :)

Getting Started with Brownies Part Two -- Uniforms

This template is for First Year (2nd Graders) Brownies. I can create a template for Second Year (3rd Graders) and/or for sash if there's a request.

We're recommending our parents go with the vest rather than the sash, because we tend to end up with a lot of fun patches, and there isn't enough room on the sash for what we have planned. Also, I'm concerned the insignia tab (ribbon) might end up lost, since they're not fastened on the sash itself, but the accompanying shirt.

We are not recommending the full uniform, however (skort, etc.). That's optional. Just the vest for us. You can, of course, do it however it best fits the needs of your kids and troop. :)

Then I also made a pricing list for the parents:

Regular Vest - $17.25

Plus-Sized Vest - $18.25

Insignia Tab (brown ribbon pin) - $2.50

Troop Numbers # # # # # @ $1.25 each - $6.25 total

American Flag - $1.75

Brownie Membership Pin - $1.50

Council ID Patch Set - $4.00

World Trefoil Pin (or can use last year's from Daisies) - $2.25 (regular) or $4.75 (gold-plated)

Gold Membership Star (optional, returning Daisies only) $1.00

2013 Cookie Sales Pin (optional, returning Daisies only) $1.15

100 Years of GS Pin (optional – limited quantity – Council shop only; not available online) $1.80

We are purchasing the Rainbow patch (as part of our Bridging to Brownies), and providing the membership discs for past Daisies. You add the membership discs and stars AFTER a year has been completed, but they carry over to the next uniform. Since our girls were Daisies last year, during the 100th Anniversary, I was able to find the additional discs celebrating this and picked them up for super cheap at our Council shop. They go between the blue disc and star. This is, of course, optional.

Parents should not purchase the Brownie discs nor stars unless this is the second year of Brownies for your troop (because again, these aren't added to uniforms until the end of the year. Many troops incorporate these in their end-of-the-year ceremonies).

Cookie Sale pins are awarded after Cookies are sold/at end of the year. 

Next up, planning your agenda for the year!

Getting Started with Brownies Part One -- Designated Roles

Welcome to Brownies! I'm so excited about this year. We had such a blast in last year's Daisies, and I know this year will be even better (if for no other reason than I now have a better idea of what I'm doing, ha!)

I'm listing Roles first, because we have a Service Unit that provides monthly events, and because I'm a returning GS Daisy leader, I have an idea of what my agenda for the year will be for Brownies. If you are new to Brownies, setting up your Agenda would be a better place to start. I will be posting about that soon!

First Steps:

Designated Roles 

Please note, I will use "Mom," "Parent," and "Volunteer" interchangeably, because we have some Volunteer Dads (and Grandmas, and more!). Make sure all Volunteers who will be handling money, transporting Brownies, and/or attending Camp are registered members and volunteers with GS. When in doubt, check your local Council to ensure everyone's cleared for various volunteer positions.

So, here we go!

Step One: Figure out the Volunteer positions that your troop will need. The recommended roles, or standard ones provided to you may or may not be a good fit for your troop. Or you may be setting up a new troop and need to come up with your own list.

Bottom line: Make a plan and be ready to adjust on the fly.

For instance, it turns out that we didn't need a couple pre-set roles for our troop last year -- Caroling Mom, for instance, ended up being unnecessary, because it was a Service Unit event, so any parents who wanted to come along and help could. We didn't need one parent from our troop to take charge. The bulk of responsibility for organizing the event was on the Service Unit (thank you, Service Unit! We love you!).

However, we realized we needed more than one Cookie Volunteer. We needed a Primary Cookie Mom and a Secondary one (to help with things like transport and organization, along with the Leader and designated Cookie Parent's help, of course).

Take into account not only things like planned upcoming activities for the year, but how many girls you have in your troop in order to figure out how many roles you will need. And as with everything in Girl Scouts, don't be afraid to delegate, accept help whenever it's offered, and adjust as needed!

Ours at this point looks something like this (but it will likely change once our meetings start up, and I'll edit this post at that point):

- Leader

- Co-Leader

- 2 Cookie Volunteers (see note above)

- 2 Scarecrow Volunteers (this is a wonderful Service Unit event; troops all in our unit create scarecrows for local businesses to display out front during the fall season) -- one for handling details like supplies (this can easily be a Troop Leader or other Volunteer helping out, though), and one for assisting/overseeing transport. My point is, you may have some similar off-site or large event that you will need designated volunteers for. Look at your Council/SU calendar of events to get an idea. Talk to other current/former Brownie leaders for advice, too!

- Snack Volunteer (oversees snack sign-up sheets -- see info on Shutterfly here).

- Meeting Volunteers (this number is dependent upon how many girls are in your troop. Always meet the GS criteria regarding adult/child ratio; at each meeting, at least one of these parents needs to be in charge of paperwork so the Leader[s] can be free to lead the meeting. The Paperwork Volunteer role can be switched out or just falls to a volunteer in attendance that day).

- Games/Activities Volunteer (last year I planned nearly all the activities for each meeting, but I was lucky to have my Co-Leader and other parents helping out at times, depending on the petal we were working on. This year we will have a designated Games Volunteer who will work closely with our planned agenda to offer fun games for the girls, so I can deal with planning only one craft/activity per meeting, rather than two).

- Camping Mom (trust me, if you're planning a trip to camp, you will need someone in addition to just you and your Co-Leader to help out! More on that later).

- First Aid/CPR Volunteer (someone in the troop needs to be certified and in attendance at every event/meeting if at all humanly possible; check with your SU/Council regarding training and never, ever forget your First Aid bag!)

- Badge Volunteers (this can be anything from giving parents a list of badges you will be working on -- Journey and/or Legacy, etc., and ask if any have skills that could be utilized; for instance a fireman, doctor, nurse, etc., could come in and lead the meeting for First Aid, and so on).

- Party Volunteers (this can include Investiture, Bridging, holiday-specific, end-of-the-year, etc. These volunteers can help organize or be responsible for planning those events, to help alleviate some burden from the Leader[s]. Don't forget about your tax-exempt status. As leader, you should have access to a tax-exemption form you can use for purchasing supplies. Talk to your local SU/Council about this).

Other Roles You Might Consider:

- Email/Website Mom ("What about troop leaders who aren't computer-savvy?" someone asked me. My response is in an ideal situation, your co-leader would be the one with computer skills, and you split the responsibility so you're handling planning or crafts, etc. Play up to your skills and utilize the skills of other Volunteers).

Note: If you're wanting to set up a website rather than using a free service like Shutterfly, be sure to investigate potentially free webhosting because GS is a non-profit. Always check with your Council/Service Unit first though, to ensure legality and privacy issues are addressed. I'm in the process of investigating this right now. More to come, if there's interest in learning details.

- Craft Mom (see Email Mom, but the reverse!)

- Fall Sales Volunteer (how many volunteers you will need for this will depend upon how active your troop is in these sales; some troops are extremely active, some are not. It all depends on what is a good fit for your girls and you!)


That's all I can think of now for specific roles. I'll add more later. :)

Hooray for Brownies! (And hooray for the gorgeous new GS logo. Love it!)

Coming Soon: Uniforms and Planning Your Agenda for the Year!

Daisies: Journeys

Someone asked me why I didn't include information about the Journeys for Daisies, here in the blog. There were a couple of reasons (in no particular order):

1. I took over for the second year of Daisies (first graders), and the year before that, the troop was much smaller, but wasn't able to meet very often, so unfortunately they didn't get to work on many patches. Because of this, and the fact that so many girls were new to Scouting this second year of Daisies, I had to basically fit two years' worth of fun/activities/patches into one.

My co-leader and I decided early on we would focus on the Daisy Petals, since they were key to learning the GS Law. I did get copies of all three Journey books from our Service Unit, and did use some ideas from them, to incorporate into our Daisy Petal activities.

However, we did not work on a specific Journey. So our girls did not earn any Journey patches. None complained. But the bottom line was, we simply did not have time to do Journeys.

2. We had a very large troop, compared to others in our Service Unit. We met twice a month, at our school. This meant that any activities away from our set meeting place were very difficult to arrange, given that several of the girls were also in Aftercare at school. To move the meeting place, or day even, would've been too burdensome for many parents.

3. I will be very honest. While I love Girl Scouts, and think it is a phenomenal organization, and am very proud to be involved in it, I am not a huge fan (thus far) of Journeys.

I understand that the goal is to help connect what has, in the past, been fairly dispersed badge-earning activities -- to make it so we are working on something that has several components that all connect. However, the format simply was not a good fit for our girls.

I'm not sure what we will do for Brownies. I have a rough idea in my mind of what the syllabus for the two years will be. How much of that will include working on Journeys? I don't know yet.

I've heard very mixed things about Journeys, but I'm not choosing sides at this point; I'm holding out hope that we will find a good fit within the Brownie Journeys for our troop!

In the meantime, I hate to disappoint anyone who comes here looking specifically for Daisy Journey suggestions. Thankfully the books have suggested activities, and of course, there's always Pinterest!

I'll be posting intro info for Brownies soon. Stay tuned!

Daisies: End-of-the-Year Party!

To celebrate our last meeting of the year, the girls decided they wanted to spend their cookie money on a trip to Build-A-Bear. We had given them several options for the party, and this was what they chose.

We had set a goal for each girl to sell an average of 50 boxes, in order to pay for the party. Any child whose parent did not wish to participate in cookie sales was given the option to pay out of pocket for her child to attend the party. All other girls -- even those who only sold 10 boxes -- were happily welcome to come. We are all sisters. We all helped out each other.

The girls did a great job, and had a wonderful time at Build-A-Bear! We opted to have it in the middle of the afternoon, and did not include a trip to any restaurants, just to keep cost down. But if you wanted to make a bigger to-do of it, you could call your local Build-A-Bear and ask what they recommend, since they do not allow food/drink in the stores. Most will be able to point you to a pizza or snack place nearby.

Anyway, we were able to purchase the special edition Thin Mints bear (though some girls chose different animals, which was fine), and stuff and dress each one in a Daisy uniform. (You can find other Girl Scout products at Build-A-Bear, here.)

We took lots of pictures to share on our Shutterfly site, got a great end-of-the-year troop picture, and the kids had an absolute blast!

How adorable are these? (And no, B-A-B is not paying me to advertise their items. I just think they're so darned cute, I can't help myself.)

Thin Mints Bear:

Daisy Uniform (sold separately):

Altogether:

Ours didn't come with shoes or shirt, though (my choice -- helped keep the cost in the $20s per girl, even though the website lists this bear ensemble at $41, because we had a coupon and opted for basic uniform only). But they did come with participation patches for the girls to put on the backs on their own uniforms, and troop number stickers for the bears, which was nice.

If you decide to take your troop to your local B-A-B shop, be sure to make reservations ahead of time, and give them your tax-exempt information. You can also ask about discounts for larger groups, etc. We had a 20% off coupon, which was an enormous help.

Next up! Bridging to Brownies, and How to Get Started with Brownies. 

See you soon! :)

Daisies: Petal Review

It's our next-to-last meeting and time for a petal review!

I cut construction paper into petal shapes and wrote the aspects of the Girl Scout Law on them, according to how many girls I expected at the meeting (you can adjust as needed for your troop). We cleared the tables and sat on the floor, in a circle, with me holding the Promise center.

Each girl had a petal and we went around the circle, with each girl giving an example of fulfilling the aspect of the Law that her petal represented.

We had snack, and then made friendship necklaces out of beads (Melissa & Doug has some great sets of wooden beads. These are what we used, but there are many other sets that are super cute), and I bought extra waxed cotton strands in the craft section at Walmart).

And lastly, we colored these pages:

Daisies: Violet Petal

Our last petal! Hooray!

Here's what we did:

Before the meeting, I'd spoken with a friend of mine who is a fellow Daisy leader, and lives across country. I got her troop number and address, and the number of girls so we had enough for them all.

Then I created "All About Us" handouts (which I'm not posting here, because they are very detailed about our troop, our service unit, and the area in which we live) for the girls to fill out. I got stickers with our Council name on them for the girls to include in the things they were making for the other troop.

And once our meeting started, we talked about the violet petal and what makes someone a sister. The girls were great. They offered up many suggestions, like if you have the same parents, or live in the same house, but we talked about things like step-families, and people who are not technically related to you, but are still considered part of your family.

We talked about how families love each other, they support each other, they stand up for and accept each other, too. And that it didn't matter if your family was near or far, they were still family. And that in Girl Scouts, we were family. We were all sisters.

The girls had a great time filling in their All About Us pages (which included a spot for them to draw or write their favorite thing about where we live), then had a snack.

After snack, we gave them construction paper and let them make special greeting cards for their sister troop way across the country.

And a few days later, I mailed it all off! We'll be excited to see what the other troop thinks of it. :)