With the flags up on time Parade also finished on time and we got straight in to an opening game of Water Bottle Flip relay. The Scouts paired off and on command had to flip a bottle filled with a few CM of water so that it landed on it base. Each time it landed the right way they moved forward 1 place, upon reaching the end their partner took over and had to complete the return journey.
The first order of business for the night was to decide on the new patrol emblem, a debate which has been going on for some weeks now. The matter was finally put to rest with a secret vote, where the 3 choices were ranked in order by each Scout. However it turned out we had a clear winner from the first choices and the patrol is now Seal Patrol, badges were given out and should be sew in place by next week please.
We then sat and had a discussion on fire awareness, looking at hazards we might encounter around the Scout hall and at home, along with what could be done to reduce these risks. The Scouts were then given iPads and tasked with finding out how they would check for fire bans or any bush fires in the area.
Once they had located the nearest warning on the Rural Fire Service website to the Scout hall we moved on to a discussion about the dangers of gas and fuel lanterns, something we don’t tend to use as much these days with low power LED lighting options. Everyone was aware of the dangers of leakage and spillage, as well as possible explosive decompression of pressurised canisters. There was also some understanding of Carbon Monoxide, such as it being heavier than air, and we carried on the discussion about this silent killer so that by the end the Scouts all knew about the dangers of incomplete combustion.
We followed this with a game that required to Scouts to navigate the hall using 8 compass point, at each point there was a task to complete involving cards. After visiting all 8 points the Scouts got to reveal their cards and see who got the strongest poker hand, unfortunately ‘2 of a kind’ was the highest score. We may revise the game for a future playing to add some extra tactics.
The game followed on to covering some of the navigation elements of the Campcraft badge:
- The eight principal points of the compass and their equivalent in degrees
- The use and care of a compass
- The relationship between true and magnetic north
- How to set and follow a bearing
- How to read a map including scale, legend, date of issue, grid references and contour lines
One of our Scouts had recently covered some of the above at school and was was able to demonstrate setting a bearing to the others. Everyone then had a go, and were given different bearings to set. We will be carrying on with map work over the coming weeks, it’s an important topic that will be required for future hikes so if anybody wishes to read up between meetings it will be a great help. The Gold Coast Library has plenty of books on the matter.
After parade the night ended with the distribution of badges, 3 Explorer and 2 Pioneer patrol badges and a number earned the Bushcraft badge.
