Daisy Girl Scout Leaders

[LisaNJ25]

The Daisy Troop Organizer in our area sent a message 5 days ago saying she did not have enough 1st grade leaders, but it wound up in my spam folder so I just saw it a few minutes ago.

I was never in scouts, none of my three older daughters were ever in scouts, but my youngest is just ACHING to do this. So I'm considering it. I'm not a real imaginative crafty kind of person (and not much for singing), so I'm wondering if it would be an injustice to even attempt this.

Looking for someone who's done it and got out.... and willing to say why. And looking for some who also tried it and managed to get beyond the limitations of themselves.

In short..... HELP!!!

Breath.. it will be ok I have a cadette troop and a 1st grade daisy troop. I was never a girl scout as a child and only started when my older daughter was in first grade. Last year I had 3 troops

One line has so many resources. There are a few sites that with plan out the who years for you. There are also yahoo groups for all levels.Google is your friend.

Personally I started out with the Daisy Petals for the first year. We have 2 left to go and will will move on the the Journeys books later this year(which might I add I hate those books)

 

[kelann7]

Over the past 2 weeks, I have been researching the internet and learning all I can about girl scouts specifically, Daisies. There are tons of ideas on the Internet - like someone said earlier - Google is your best friend - google anything you want to know.

Since this is the first year - we are going to concentrate on earning the petals. I will probably do the Journeys books next year.

I collected $50.00 from each parent for dues - I do not want to collect money at every meeting, especially at this young age - I rather collect up front one time.

This Friday is our first meeting - it is going to be just a Getting to know each other meeting. I will start with having the girls get in a circle and join hands - we will say a prayer - then we will say the Pledge of Allegiance and then I will show them the Girl Scout Sign and have them repeat the Girl Scout Promise. Then we will join hands and move forward into the circle and say "Hey Girls" and then move back and one by one say "Kelly is here" going around the circle. This is how we will begin each meeting.

Then we will have a snack - we are meeting right after school and I think they will be hungry. I assigned each girl (parent) one meeting to bring a snack. We have 11 girls - The girl who brought the snack will be responsible for helping to hand out the snacks and juice boxes and clean up after. By doing this, she will earn the yellow petal - Friendly and Helpful. So, at each meeting, one girl will get the yellow petal. At this first meeting, I will talk about the Girl Scout Law and explain how they will earn this yellow petal by helping at snack time.

For an activity, at this first meeting, we will make name tags. I found some flower shaped foam at Michael's and then we will use markers and stickers to decorate it and I will punch 2 holes at the top and string ribbon so that it hangs around their neck.

After they decorate the tags, I will have each girl introduce herself and show her tag to the group.

We will end the meeting with the Frienship Squeeze.

I'm working on ideas for the rest of the meetings and love to hear more ideas.

Thanks.

Kelly

 

[arobeen]

I just had my training this morning. I'm co-leading a troop with two friends. So far we have 6 girls, all K, in our troop. I'm a cub scout mom, so this is very different for me! I've already learned some things here, so thanks! I am confused about the Promise Center and earning that. In the first meeting, by focusing on the promise, do the girls then earn that center at the end of the meeting, or is that handed out at a later meeting?

 

[skw444]

We actually wait to have the girls earn the Promise center once they can recite the promise by herself. We wait and pass out the Promise center at the Investiture ceremony. And we wait to have the Investiture Ceremony until all the girls know the Promise.

 

[arobeen]

We actually wait to have the girls earn the Promise center once they can recite the promise by herself. We wait and pass out the Promise center at the Investiture ceremony. And we wait to have the Investiture Ceremony until all the girls know the Promise.

You have touched on my second point of confusion - the Investiture Ceremony. This is starting to make sense, though. We are meeting once a month. So, our first meeting will be a get to know you meeting that will also focus on the Promise. Let's assume the girls can recite the Promise by the next meeting. At that next meeting we focus on one of the petals, can the girls earn that petal? Or at the Investiture Ceremony (say this is the third meeting), would we hand out the Promise center and any petals earned up to that point? Also, we have decided to have the girls purchase the tunics. Can they wear the tunics at the first few meetings or do they have to wait until the Investiture Ceremony? Finally, I've read about a pin being handed out at the Investiture Ceremony. Does this pin have to be earned also, or at the Daisy level is it just the Promise center that is handed out?

I'm so sorry for all the questions!! I feel like once I have a handle on these points, then I can start to plan a bit more. THANK YOU for the insight you have given so far and for any more you can pass along!! I really do appreciate it!

 

[kelann7]

I do think that you can be flexible on how you handle certain things - like I'm not doing a formal investiture ceremony. For this first year - I'm keeping it simple. They will get their tunics at the first meeting along with the Daisy membership pin. I will make a big deal about Welcome to Girl Scouts.

I am going to give them the Promise center when they can recite the promise, so they may not all get this at the same time. I heard of troops giving out petals and badges at various ceremonies throughout the year, but I'm going to give them out right away. At this young age, I think they need to be rewarded right away. So, at most meetings, they will earn one petal and I will give them out at the end of the meeting.

We are meeting every other Friday, but if there is no school, then there is no meeting. We started late (no meetings in September) and with the holidays, there are a couple of months where we will only have one meeting. So, for the whole school year, we are only having 13 meetings. The first meeting is getting to know each other - the second we are concentrating on the promise, then we have one meeting for each petal and then a end of year party. I'm actually thinking of combining 2 petals into one, so that we can have a Christmas party where we just have fun and not work on a petal.

Next year, it will be tricky because I will have 1st graders who have been in a year and new Kindergarteners who are new. I'll have to figure out what to do next year. This year, everyone is new, but I have 8 1st graders and 4 Kindergarteners. My child is in Kinder, so I will be the troop leader next year also. I think next year we will work on the Journeys, but I have to figure out how to get the new girls to earn petals without repeating the same things for the other girls.

Let's keep the ideas and questions coming. This is going to be fun.

Thanks.

Kelly

 

[Marshay]

Thanks OP for this thread.

My dd5 wanted to join Daisies but the waiting list is 35 girls!!! So another mom and I are starting our own troop. We know nothing about Daisies or GS except they sell cookies.

However, from many wonderful moms on this thread and another one plus having a co-leader, we have the courage to start a troop. We're both pretty crafty so I think we'll focus a lot of activities on that.

For earning badges and just helping our community: We would really like to teach the girls some christmas songs and then sing them to a local senior citizens center. I remember my grandparents in a home would just 'come to life' whenever kids visited. There's a local trail by our school that we can go to and pick up trash and then play at the playground. Maybe we'll grow flowers from seed and give to the seniors, too. I'm hoping to do a some fun service projects in addition to the meetings.

We plan to meet one time in a leader/parent's house and the next time we'd do a service or fun activity. I'd love to meet right after school but both the co-leader and I have 18 & 20 month old girls, too, so we have to wait until DHs come home to watch them.

 

[anl]

Will the training that we have to go to tell us what all these things mean? How often is everyone meeting? Are we way behind since we have not begun yet? We have to do the training before we can start and the next training is next week.

 

[acomasdiaz]

Will the training that we have to go to tell us what all these things mean? How often is everyone meeting? Are we way behind since we have not begun yet? We have to do the training before we can start and the next training is next week.

My DD is still waiting for a troop to be put together. I just got an email today that it looks like we might be ready to go. So, I definitely don't think you're way behind.

 

[Marshay]

Will the training that we have to go to tell us what all these things mean? How often is everyone meeting? Are we way behind since we have not begun yet? We have to do the training before we can start and the next training is next week.

I haven't done the training yet either. I just applied Sunday night and someone is supposed to drop off paperwork for me. We're waiting on background check and references.

I'm hoping to meet at the earliest end of October. I don't think we'll be ready before then.

Do you only meet during the school year?

 

[skw444]

You have touched on my second point of confusion - the Investiture Ceremony. This is starting to make sense, though. We are meeting once a month. So, our first meeting will be a get to know you meeting that will also focus on the Promise. Let's assume the girls can recite the Promise by the next meeting. At that next meeting we focus on one of the petals, can the girls earn that petal? Or at the Investiture Ceremony (say this is the third meeting), would we hand out the Promise center and any petals earned up to that point? Also, we have decided to have the girls purchase the tunics. Can they wear the tunics at the first few meetings or do they have to wait until the Investiture Ceremony? Finally, I've read about a pin being handed out at the Investiture Ceremony. Does this pin have to be earned also, or at the Daisy level is it just the Promise center that is handed out?

We actually hold a Court of Awards to pass out petals/patches to make it feel more special when they earn them. At the Daisy level, we hold them more frequently. At the Brownie level, we're holding them every 3 months. We'll use the Investiture Ceremony as our first Court of Awards. At the Investiture, we'll pass out the Promise center and their Insignia Tab with the WAGGS pin and Daisy Membership pin. We'll also be working on the Honest and Fair petal so we'll probably pass that out at the Investiture too.

 

[skw444]

Will the training that we have to go to tell us what all these things mean? How often is everyone meeting? Are we way behind since we have not begun yet? We have to do the training before we can start and the next training is next week.

I don't think you're behind. Our school year starts early here (Aug. 9) plus I had the added benefit of having already been approved and had my training since this is my 3rd year. Most of our new troops are still getting started.

Our Service Unit has been my best resource for learning everything. We have a big and active Service Unit. We have meetings once a month and have special meetings just for new leaders as well.

 

[dc8atp]

Which part of Ohio are you in? Our council doesn't allow Daisy's to camp! I just recently became a Daisy Leader as well and our first meeting is 10-6-10. I am in the Girl Scouts of Western Ohio area.
Kari

 

[dc8atp]

Over the past 2 weeks, I have been researching the internet and learning all I can about girl scouts specifically, Daisies. There are tons of ideas on the Internet - like someone said earlier - Google is your best friend - google anything you want to know.

Since this is the first year - we are going to concentrate on earning the petals. I will probably do the Journeys books next year.

I collected $50.00 from each parent for dues - I do not want to collect money at every meeting, especially at this young age - I rather collect up front one time.

This Friday is our first meeting - it is going to be just a Getting to know each other meeting. I will start with having the girls get in a circle and join hands - we will say a prayer - then we will say the Pledge of Allegiance and then I will show them the Girl Scout Sign and have them repeat the Girl Scout Promise. Then we will join hands and move forward into the circle and say "Hey Girls" and then move back and one by one say "Kelly is here" going around the circle. This is how we will begin each meeting.

Then we will have a snack - we are meeting right after school and I think they will be hungry. I assigned each girl (parent) one meeting to bring a snack. We have 11 girls - The girl who brought the snack will be responsible for helping to hand out the snacks and juice boxes and clean up after. By doing this, she will earn the yellow petal - Friendly and Helpful. So, at each meeting, one girl will get the yellow petal. At this first meeting, I will talk about the Girl Scout Law and explain how they will earn this yellow petal by helping at snack time.

For an activity, at this first meeting, we will make name tags. I found some flower shaped foam at Michael's and then we will use markers and stickers to decorate it and I will punch 2 holes at the top and string ribbon so that it hangs around their neck.

After they decorate the tags, I will have each girl introduce herself and show her tag to the group.

We will end the meeting with the Frienship Squeeze.

I'm working on ideas for the rest of the meetings and love to hear more ideas.

Thanks.

Kelly

Use some caution with the foam and markers. When I was working at GS resident camp last summer, they made me a name tag to represent my camp name....Big Foot. Needless to say my name tag was a gray foam hiking boot. They used a black marker(unknown on type/brand) to make the sole of my boot. That name tag which I used this summer as well is still bleeding black marker. It gets on my shirt or anything else it touches. Just for an FYI. I went by our Council office today and in our resource room they have a button maker and for a .25 charge each I can have the girls make a button with their name on it. I thought of putting a daisy flower outline on it with their name in a cute but readable font. Then the girls can color the flower and we will make a button name tag out of it. We can still make a ribbon to hang it on or yarn or simply pin it on them.

 

[dc8atp]

Yeah for this Thread. I saw the old thread first and was semi frustrated that is had no recent posts then I found this new thread. AWESOME!

I was recruited in May to be a Leader for my DD5's Daisy troop. At the time they had only one other girl interested for this coming fall. I have been a registered GS volunteer for a couple of years as I give a week at resident camp as a counselor(nurse/lifeguard or whatever I end up doing) so that my niece can go to camp at a drastically reduced rate. So I sat for 4 months now having no idea what exactly Daisy's did or what I would need to do for them. Luckily my camp friends from the 80's have come to my aid. I have an awesome co-leader that I worked with at GS resident camp in the late 80's that is willing to help. Between her and I we could sing camp songs for hours without stopping. You may need earplugs, but the kids don't mind.

I have finally had some time off of Nursing school this week to work on this Daisy plan. The one thing I am concerned about for my girls parents is the cost. When you are starting up a troop it is hard having no start up money. I enjoy my DS7 cub scouts that ask for dues once a year of $40 and that covers his registration renewal and all of his awards, activities, banquet, etc. I really would rather not deal with $1 per meeting, etc. the bookeeping on that is tedious. However, having nothing to start with and all of the drama and hoops of opening a checking account for the troop makes things tough as well.

I went to the scout shop recently and purchased all of the "uniform" and books necessary to be a Daisy and the cost came to over $50 and that only included the tunic(apron thingie) and pins/petals/patches an activites book and 1 journey book. Ugh. That is on top of $12 reg. and troop dues. That is a lot of money to shell out on a 5 year old that you are not sure will even last the whole year. So, I talked to a Service Unit member and troop leader and she suggested something a friend of hers in MI had done. They had t-shirts made with the daisy on it and then as the girls earned each petal they used fabric markers to color them in.

So I checked into this and found a huge local screen printer that is willing to print the t-shirts for $9 each with a set up fee of $40. They will put the troop number on the front of the shirts as well for identification purposes. I am having ours be white t-shirts with blue lettering and outline. I asked about pricing for sweatshirt for winter etc. She mentioned that if we order both items at the same time the cost would be significantly lower. It ended up with the approximate cost being $20 for both a t-shirt and a hoodie or more like $16 for a t-shirt and a crewneck sweatshirt. The adult sizes were the same price as I priced them out for my co-leader and I. I picked either a royal blue or a pink sweatshirt for the color. I am going to run all of this by the parents to get their input. I am thinking that since this is Oct. already and the shirts will take 2 weeks to have made that I plan to give my DD5 her sweatshirt for Christmas.

The good news is that when I asked her about other troops using my set up, she was ok with it and would only charge a different troop $5'ish to change the troop name. Now I just have to find all of the colors of the petals in fabric markers. One of the mothers in my troop has some of them already. I am thinking once we get the promise down we will start wearing our insignia with the daisy scout pin. So essentially the parents will have to pay for an activities book, a t-shirt, and we will probably take the pin/insignia piece out of the dues. We are also planning to see fall product and hope to use some of those funds to purchase items as well.

I think the one journey book would be a good Christmas present from parents as well.

Since this post has gotten really long winded I will post again with some of my activity ideas.

Kari

 

[cerberus]

I would be glad to share my ideas. Is there anything specific you're interested in? We're having our first official meeting this week. I've already worked up the "lesson plan" for the meeting.

Pre-Activity 5 min - We are going to work on a craft involving the Promise. The girls are going to trace their hand on construction paper and then cut it out, then glue it next to the Girl Scout promise with the hands making the Girl Scout sign.

Opening 10 min - We start every meeting with the Pledge and Girl Scout Promise. We'll have each girl introduce herself. Then we'll learn the "I'm a Girl Scout Daisy" song. I downloaded it off the Girl Scout website so I don't have to sing and the girls can all hear it.

Business 5 min - We explain what the Daisy Circle is. We'll collect dues and talk about Kapers.

Activity 30 min - My co-leader is in charge of coming up with a craft that centers around the Girl Scout Promise since that's what we're focusing on this week.

Clean-Up 5 min - We'll discuss that Girl Scouts always leave a place cleaner than they found it.

Closing 5 min - We'll learn the Friendship Circle and Squeeze and end it with the song "Make New Friends".

Our next meeting we will start to focus on the Journeys. We've chosen to do the Daisy Garden Journey. Personally, I have not enjoyed the Journey's (prefer the petals) and would love to hear ideas of how everyone is incorporating the Journeys in their meetings!

THANKS!

For earning badges and just helping our community: We would really like to teach the girls some christmas songs and then sing them to a local senior citizens center. I remember my grandparents in a home would just 'come to life' whenever kids visited. There's a local trail by our school that we can go to and pick up trash and then play at the playground. Maybe we'll grow flowers from seed and give to the seniors, too. I'm hoping to do a some fun service projects in addition to the meetings.

So it sounds like most people focus on crafts, but I am not so crafty, but love the outdoors and really want to incorporate doing more outdoor or interactive things with the kids......does anyone else have examples of what has worked for them?

 

[dc8atp]

My first meeting is going to be next Wed. Our troop meetings will be every other Wed from 7-8pm. This is late enough to have dinner done, but early enough to get home to bed. No snack should be needed due to the time. This will save us time and hassles. I will make a couple of exceptions for parties, etc.

I plan to talk to the parents in one room and the kids will go with my co-leader to another room to play a game to get to know each other, learn the promise, do a promise craft(scoutingweb.com), Make a button nametag, and make a list of rules for the troop. This will actually begin the process for one of the petals since they have to take responsibility for what they say and do.

I will talk to the parents about registration, dues, uniforms, parent help. I am printing out a form for help from parents for different tasks like field trip driver, cookie capt., newsletter, meeting helper, etc. I am also planning to have a wish list of things our troop needs that parents can donate. This will tie in to a project next month.

For the second meeting we are going to jump in right away and get dirty. I have planned a project for the Make the world a better place petal. We are going to plant flowers to bloom in the early to mid spring of next year at the school where we hold our meetings. This will teach the girls teamwork, patience, and making an investment that they don't see immediate results from. Then in the spring we can walk out and watch the flowers and bulbs grow and bloom. It is a win win situation as I have gotten the flowers and mulch both donated. We provide the labor and love.

Meeting number 3 will be a belated birthday party for Juliette Low, each girl will bring a present in honor of JL which will benefit our troop. Wet Wipes for cleaning up after ourselves, kleenex for runny daisy noses, construction paper, foam craft pieces, bandaids, etc. I will have a list that parents can choose from during our parent meeting. This will save on costs on dues.

I am also trying to plan to help another towns troop with a Christmas shoebox project. I would like for our girls to not only gather supplies to take to them, but I would love for our girls to assist them in assembling the shoe boxes(considerate and caring petal). Then we can send cards that we make to the other troop which would earn a petal for being a sister to every girl scout(A. By helping them, B. by sending a card). My co-leader is a mail carrier and she has suggested we put the cards in an envelope and she will take us to our local post office to tour and see how our cards are going to get there.

The thought is there to make cards for the local nursing home to show that we are Friendly and helpful.

I like the toothpast idea for respect myself and others.
I like the Egg hunt idea for honest and fair.
I think selling cookies is being courageous...especially the booths, strong....I am not sure what we will do for that? Carrying the boxes of cookies? JK
I work at a rec center though I am sure I can come up with something for that.
I am thinking of going to a local nature center/farm to work on the using resources wisely. However, I am going to suggest that parents send in a reusable water bottle for our meetings which would actually show that we are using our resources wisely.
Respect Authority....maybe a police or fire( I work for the FD) visit? We also have a troop dad that is an air traffic controller.

Feel free to comment or throw suggestions out there. We are all in the same boat lost somewhere on the waters, I am tossing out a buoy....grab hold and kick! I am open to a pen pal troop if you are interested let me know.

Kari

PS. I do have Disney history. My folks have been DVC members since 96'. My DH and I were married at WL 00'. My pregnancy with my DS7 was announced at Whispering Canyon Cafe a year and one half later. My daughter was conceived hours before heading to WDW(unbeknownst to me at the time) so she managed to swim in the right direction and connect while I was busy riding all of the rides at WDW. My most unique trip was on 9-16-01 when things were eerily quiet there.

 

[kelann7]

In regards to keeping costs down - personally I bought one of the Daisy Activity books and I don't think it is worth the money. I may decide to make copies of a few pages for the girls to do, but I doubt it. And this first year, we are going to just concentrate on earning the petals, so I'm not making them buy the Journeys books - hopefully we will get some cookie money and I'll use that money to buy the Journey books.

For the petals, we are doing some crafts, but some of them we will do games or another activity. Also, Oriental trading has some good craft kits that would be easy for the kids to do and less work for the leaders, also.

We have a meeting the week of Halloween, so we wanted to do something for Halloween, but I also plan to talk about Juliette Gordon Low's birthday and how she loved animals. I found animal masks that the kids can decorate with colors or markers or paint at Oriental Trading - I ordered these, so this will tie in talking about Juliette and Halloween. After they decorate the masks, they will put them on and "trick or treat" and me and the co-leader will hand out treats.

Thanks.

Kelly

 

[Marshay]

THANKS!

So it sounds like most people focus on crafts, but I am not so crafty, but love the outdoors and really want to incorporate doing more outdoor or interactive things with the kids......does anyone else have examples of what has worked for them?

Since we plan to meet 2x/month, the 1st meeting will be GS basics and a craft. The 2nd meeting of the month will be going outside and doing something (when possible, and after we have the training).

So our 2nd meeting will be things like a Nature Scavenger Hunt, trips to a grocery store or animal shelter or farm. We plan to ask our school for a small task we can do (maybe plant some flowers in one section of the school yard) or help the library. Maybe we'll get ladybugs from a local nursery and release them in the school yard or we'll grow butterflies and release them.

I'm still thinking up ideas but I really don't want us just doing songs, games & crafts for each meeting. When I think of Scouting, I also think of getting out and doing things and I really hope we can do that.

So, that's my long-winded way to say, I think you can definitely do a lot of things besides crafts.

Also, I haven't checked it out yet but if you Google "Scouting with the Mouse", I heard that's a good site to incorporate Disney and Scouting together!

 

[cerberus]

Since we plan to meet 2x/month, the 1st meeting will be GS basics and a craft. The 2nd meeting of the month will be going outside and doing something (when possible, and after we have the training).

So our 2nd meeting will be things like a Nature Scavenger Hunt, trips to a grocery store or animal shelter or farm. We plan to ask our school for a small task we can do (maybe plant some flowers in one section of the school yard) or help the library. Maybe we'll get ladybugs from a local nursery and release them in the school yard or we'll grow butterflies and release them.

I'm still thinking up ideas but I really don't want us just doing songs, games & crafts for each meeting. When I think of Scouting, I also think of getting out and doing things and I really hope we can do that.

So, that's my long-winded way to say, I think you can definitely do a lot of things besides crafts.

Also, I haven't checked it out yet but if you Google "Scouting with the Mouse", I heard that's a good site to incorporate Disney and Scouting together!

THANKS
I am with you, if we can be outside or do activities other than crafts then I think it will keep me sane. We have a nice merto pak near us that has regular activies also that I thought I could incorporate. I figure I can keep the crafts for bad weather, but also during bad weather I am planning on having a few guest speakers (police, fire, stranger awareness). I am still just starting the whole process so I am just trying to wrap my head around all this