Guiders Staff Room Part 4

[Groovee]

Moving on from Part 3

I have completely forgotten to let the commissioner know that I am moving away. I've been so busy with visitors and getting things sorted for the move that I just haven't thought of it. I am only an advisor, not currently a leader, but I feel awful.
I need to let her know as quickly as possible.

River We're only human! I'm sure she'll understand. And as you're not a leader, it's not like you're leaving a unit in the lurch.

Hopefully you'll have a warm welcome in your new area. Hope the moves goes well

Hi all - Rainbow leaders help needed!!

I’m a Guide Leader of 15 years, but my DDs Rainbow Unit is closing due to lack of leader so I’ve said I’ll pitch in till we find a new leader.

So - starting and ending - I know they sing the Rainbow song at the end, I’ll YouTube that.

Fave games? Is Port / Starboard understandable by them?!

It’s a unit of about 12/15 with only 4 remaining from last year.

Any Rainbow best tips welcome!!!

Found you all! Hope you're all enjoying your summer break.

@Rodent01 - our set up is:
They arrive and play with our basket of balls etc song
Olivia (one girl takes an Olivia game home each week and then takes photos and describes what they did over the weekend).
Game - duck, duck goose, bean game, traffic lights, corners, stuck in the mud, queenie, queenie, parachute games. (And port/starboard) all work well.
Activity - crafts from baker Ross work well. Most of the new UMAs take significantly shorter than the actual time allowed.
End of meeting song
Finish.

Rainbow games - sleeping hedgehogs, the 'splat bang zoom' UMA, duck duck goose (including where they say a word of the promise per person and 'helpful' replaces 'goose'), ladders, hide and seek, toilet tag, fruit salad, Chinese whispers, mouse trap

Did anyone here go to WINGS 2014?

We’ve signed up to go next year and I’m trying to think what extras to allow for in the budget. Gas for cooking, squash and snacks (ingredients for 3 meals provided), travel to get there.

Do we need costumes for the opening ceremony? Camp t-shirts or neckers - are they included or extra? If we travel by train, do they offer a shuttle from the station?

It is years since I’ve been - I think 2003 was my last one!

All the district accounts were due in yesterday. Some still outstanding and no contact. I don't do accounts 🙈

Accounts gives me the Fear. We have a wonderfully patient miracle worker who does ours. I periodically post an envelope full of cash, recipts & post-it notes through her door and she magically transforms it into something coherent.
She's even learned to address cheques to my DH, as she knows that I'll "put them somewhere safe" and they'll never be seen again like spring term's hall rent cheque that I only had to countersign & pass on
She sends me lists of who owes subs and who paid for pack holiday. She's invaluable

Thanks to the pp for Rainbow thoughts, am creating a document of ideas ready for our planning meeting in 3 weeks!

Could anyone help me with brownies interest badges? DD joined just before summer holidays started, we have the badge book and I was thinking of having her do an interest badge to stop her being boooooorrred, but the specifications seem a bit vague. Is there any guidance on how much work you need to do, e.g. number of hours to spend on it or x sheets of A4 writing?

seeking - no, they just need to put in some effort, which badge were you thinking of doing?

@SeekingShade The clauses are deliberately vague so that they can be a challenge for every girl. A 7 yr old will do something very different to a 10 yr old. A girl with one type of SEN issue will achieve differently to another. The Brown Owl will be looking for that girl doing something to the best she can, having achieved something new.

Eg - I have a Brownie who produced a set of lovely hand drawn & beautifully written posters for her Local History badge. She did another set of posters in v similar style for her Jobs badge. When she said she was planning her Aviation badge, I asked her to find a new way of presenting it.

I've had scrapbooks, photos, scrawls in notebooks... The main thing is to have fun trying something new.

Thanks, I was looking at the inventor badge and it has research female inventors or something like that. DD would be perfectly happy to write 'I spent 5 minutes sat next to mum whilst she googled inventors' 😉 but if I said something like pick 2 inventors and write a page on each she would. The actual inventing bit is fine, she'd happily spend the rest of the holidays sellotaping her creation 😃

The inventor badge looks like fun.

Did anyone else get an email inviting them to apply to be in the focus group for coming up with better names for the 18-30s?
I am tempted evev though technically I am no longer in the country and have joined 'foreign guides'. It's not very far...
It's Brownies I'll be doing here and I'm being thrown in the deep end to take over a pack that was dwindeling but has 14 new enquiries to start this year with Brown owl retiring!
I still need to get kitted out with uniform

Hi, brownie leader here, how often do you have joint meetings with other rainbow or guide units?
Thanks

Totally panicking about new programme
Just don't know where to start
Any ideas
Am seriously considering giving up because of this and maybe someone younger would come in take it on

@user1487194234

Deep breath. Have you done any of the online training yet? Start with that, then join the informal Facebook groups. There are section specific and s programme one.

Why not take this term as a warm up? What section do you run? You could dabble in some UMAs (unit meeting activities) this side of the half term and then try half a skills builder just before and after the half term.

Take it very slowly and be kind to yourself. We started last September and got muddled up. Did well in the January term and tried a challenge badge and skills builder for the summer which went very wrong. This term we are doing two skills builders tun by two adults and splitting by age.

@VictoriaBlue5 Guides and Brownies on different nights at different halls, so it's really hard to do something together. We do about one district event every 18 months or so at thinking day or Christmas.

My mate runs a brownie unit that overlaps with a guide unit upstairs so they get lots of joint activities.

Thank you Becles Will try that

@user1487194234

The skills builders work better with Guides because they choose and run themselves in patrols like the GFIs

Thanks @Becles I thought it would vary, good to know x

@user1487194234

You’ll be grand. Honestly.

As well as the online Trainings, have you any physical ones (as it were) you could access? If your County haven’t any organised, you could contact your County Training Team to ask if there are plans for any & if not, request a “fireside Training” - pretty much meeting up informally with someone for a chat, or getting together a small group of people & having a wee Training session in someone’s home: invariably much more relaxed than something at a County Training Day though there’s always a risk of being threatened with a literal Naughty Step if you don’t behave... fairly sure main reason that didn’t happen was because I’d happily have gone & played with the cat... ahem... & much more opportunity to shape content & ask heaps of questions.

It really is quite pick up & go - there are 5 UMA packs [per Section] now & 6 is due out soon so plenty of choice available if you want to weed out the ones that you’d rather self-immolate than do ease yourself in a bit; & the Skills Builders are fairly self-explanatory. Have you got/can you get copies?

Hi all, new Brown Owl here (although I've been Little Owl with my group for 5 years).

Just wanted a bit of a rant with people who will understand! I planned a trip out for beginning of October, organised before the Summer. Messaged the woman who runs the place 2 weeks ago to check it's still OK to go ahead, no response. Messaged again this week, no response. I dont want to give out forms etc. until she has confirmed and if I don't hear back by Wednesday it will be too late. Why do people find it so hard to reply to emails? Even if she just said "sorry it's no longer convenient" at least I would have an answer!

Welcome @BeanBag7

Can you call her in case something's going on and follow up with an email deadline for a response or cancellation?