What did your DC do for DofE Bronze volunteering?

[drspouse]

My DS is 14 and has some SEN and also has epilepsy. Currently, the epilepsy is more problematic in extracurriculars as he's increasing in social confidence, though he doesn't do much in the way of really challenging extracurriculars e.g. competitive sport/high level instruments. One of his needs is dyspraxia but he's very up for having a go at a lot of things that he will never be a professional at.

It's probably time to ask if he wants to do DofE (anything with a badge is usually a yes for him). His school doesn't run it but he can do it through Scouts.

We can find a skill and a physical activity for him as he does guitar, some skill type activities at home, or at school but he could take them up independently, and he goes to junior Lifesaving and disability skiing.

It may be a difficult task to find an expedition that will take him (currently Scouts ask us to go on camps, though not to sleep in with him - partly for safeguarding but also thankfully he hasn't had a fit in his sleep for years) but we can make some enquiries.

I'm just wondering what your DC have done for volunteering. Not all the ideas will suit him - and some won't be available to him (e.g. his school would not let him listen to younger children read, and I doubt the nearest primary school to his school would let him either) or that interesting to him, but I thought it was worth asking for All The Ideas. So just dump them here, don't worry if I've already mentioned them or if you aren't sure if they'd work for him.

So far I've thought of helping at Beavers, even if it's mainly doing the drinks and snacks; volunteer maintenance at one of the local Scout camp sites; and volunteering at one of the local parks (there are two that have regular volunteering mornings, but one of them is during the school day, and they are each only once a month so that might not work).

Ds became a volunteer coach at the sport he already did for his. They agreed he could do this and at 19 he still does volunteer sometimes. Might be worth asking as they already know him.

One DD volunteered at the library and the other helped with the local Brownie pack.

Do your Scouts own their own hall/hut? I’d cheerfully sign off on a volunteer to clean the place once a week!

parkrun/ junior parkrun volunteering
charity shops
food bank
brownies / rainbows / beavers / cubs
anything community gardening, local park, graveyard maintenance type group
helping with younger groups of sports teams / swimming club
if he likes making drinks etc are they any church groups that meet and have refreshments or coffee after church on Sundays?

DD1 is doing hers at the moment and one of the younger ones in the year so isn't the age 14 that lots of places like the charity shops seem to need. She's doing reading buddies in school for her volunteering and some of the other kids are doing things like litter picking.

DD2 might be more difficult when she wants to do it because of similar SEN issues (apart from she doesn't have epilepsy) - I'm imagining that because she's a bit of a massive mother hen type the local Beavers would happily let her back to help with the little ones as she's quite often co-opted down the age ranges at scout events for various younger kids who need a bit of a buddy. (DD1 and helping Cubs/Beavers wasn't a go-er as one of the Beaver leaders really openly hated her).

As for aging out of Scouts - we're about to hit this with DD1 - they tend to let them run out the school term they hit 14 in, possibly with a little bit more flex for some of the kids with SEN (so they let DD2 stay in Beavers longer to move up with her younger friend). DD1's hit peak teenage apathy age and doesn't want to carry on once she ages out though.

Our library takes DoE volunteers - a good option for shyer youngsters.

Litter picking. Go on Facebook and there will probably be a group of volunteers already. The council will lend equipment and high visibility vest etc.

Or he could go around measuring potholes and report them on the council portal. Only half joking.

My ds did DofE during covid, which limited the volunteering options, but he did an online, citizen science portal called Zooniverse. It wasthings like analyzing photos to indicate if they did/did not contain certain animals, etc. He took screenshot, kept logs of the projects he was involved in, and I think there was an online tracker showing the hours he put in. He spoke to his tutor at school about signing him off on it, and they'd have regular check ins to see what projects he was involved in.

Mine helps in a local library, shelving, tea making, talking to ppl

Mine did helping out at synagogue, listening to little ones read Hebrew etc. Churches/mosques/any religion you have would be welcoming I’m sure? He could just do teas and coffees?

Mine did different things.

They did scout/guides work with younger children than them.
One took part in church choir.
One played the organ at church.
They baked and served refreshments after services at church.
They spent time as Church Guardians.
They helped out on village days.
They were at the local hospice talking & playing games with patients in the livingg room supervised by a nurse.
They helped younger children with homework at school club.
They picked up litter at the beachdays.

Only just caught up with this - no we don't, rented from the church.

Loads of great ideas, thanks.
I think we're going to try a taster of some of these with him as he finds it hard to visualise things he hasn't seen/done.

Volunteer at Park Run (Saturday mornings) or Junior Park Run (Sunday mornings). Bonus is that if an adult gives him a lift they can help too rather than be bored for an hour. He won’t be left alone with kids, won’t be responsible for anyone’s wellbeing. There’s lots of different jobs with varying levels of responsibility and needing various levels of confidence, so the volunteer organiser can assign him roles that suit. Happens every week, so doesn’t matter too much if he misses a week for holidays/birthdays etc as they can just go back to it the next week. There’s generally a big group of volunteers, so less likely to “need” him to turn up to run the sessions.

I'm a Junior Parkrun volunteer - they are on Sundays if that helps. It is a lovely and very gentle community. Not as fraught as our adult parkrun, because the numbers are smaller (150 v's 1500).

Why do it at all if he’s not enjoying it? What benefit will he get from it?

The local Wildlife Trust had a specific volunteering group for teenagers, DD did that for bronze and silver. They were mainly building ‘outdoors classrooms’ - path laying, tree planting, making dead hedges.

You only do things for other people if you enjoy it? How peculiar.

The benefit is that he serves his community and does not say bollocks to everyone else.

He hasn't even started it yet and has no concept of what it is (except that it involves a badge) so I'm not sure where you got the idea from that he isn't enjoying it.
Also, this isn't a factor in whether to start things or keep trying them in our house. After a while this comes into play but we say the DCs have to give everything a try. Both of them have a habit of saying "I don't want to" to everything but then enjoying it.

He had set up some coaching cricket with a senior coach at cricket club for DC holiday club but sadly COVID hit and everything closed down. In the end he had to do litter picking as he could do it on his own. We got him a picker thing from Amazon and he sent picking litter each week if or a couple of hours with a black sack. Came home with 2-3 sacks of litter each time.

Litter picking, was great for my dc with autism and anxiety as we just borrowed the littler pickers from the council and went around whenever and wherever we wanted.

I was talking about the DofE, not the helping people. Did you not realise that you can help people without ticking a box on the DoE form? How peculiar!

And yet you didn't even see anything saying he wasn't enjoying it since he hasn't even started it!

But it's not just a tick box. It's being part of a bigger thing. Community.