1) Plan the Den Program

Familiarize yourself with the relevant Cub rank Handbook, and understand how it works and check out the online resources.

The First thing to do is to prepare your cubs to get their Bobcat badge.  This is a one-off rank that every cub has to attain before he can go any further but he does not have to repeat it from one year to the next. Target the December Pack Meeting for the boys to receive their bobcat badges.

Then look through the handbook to identify how many achievements you need from which sections in order to attain the rank badge.  For example, for Bears you have to choose 12 Achievements out of a possible 20 whereas for Tigers you have to complete everything in the book.

Every Achievement is marked at the front of that section by a black number in the top left hand side of the first page.

Each Achievement is broken down into smaller steps called ‘Requirements.’

These are marked by the small cap letters of the alphabet. So, 7.a. would be Achievement 7, Requirement a.

If the rank program you are following gives you choice, decide which achievements your den will do and write them out or mark them in the book.

Some activities are better suited for den work than others.  

So you have to decide which achievements (or which part of which achievements) you want to try to do as part of a den meeting and which ones (or parts of) you will set as homework to do outside of the den meeting.

The Quartermaster can obtain a copy of the program guide for you. It is designed for a den that meets every week.  So, there is plenty of great ideas to fill out den meetings when not working on requirements.

DELEGATE: if you want to spend a lot of time on cubs, you can do everything yourself. But other people also want to feel involved so you have to give them something to do. They end up being much more involved and enjoy it much more. So, get your den families involved. Identify which activities would be good for particular families to be responsible for organising. If you want to short-cut this process of organising the year’s meeting plan even further, rip up the handbook and tell each family they are responsible for choosing one achievement that they will have to teach the den. Give them the date of the den meeting and let them organise that meeting from A to Z.
      
2) Prepare for the Pinewood Derby 

This is a somewhat bizarre cubs event that we ritually follow every year and which the boys seem to enjoy. It is a race day set around placing toy cars on a 6-lane downhill track.
See various links on website for ideas and more information about the Pinewood Derby.

Each cub scout has to make a small wooden toy car. Ask the QuarterMaster to provide your den with the right number of car kits – paid for by the Pack.

 The idea is to teach your son how to create his own model (design and paintwork) as well as introduce him to some basic wood working skills. The boys can take pride in doing something all of their own (with a little guidance in using the saw and other dangerous tools).

The wood working sessions can be done as a den activity (a Saturday morning is a good time, with as many Dads involved as possible) or it can be done by individual families. If you opt to do it as a den, you can start the basics of producing the cars as a den get-together – provide some snacks,  a BBQ lunch maybe and make it into a den family bonding session. This is a great way to get to know each other.

You need to get started on this in early October – as October is full of half term holidays and the race day takes place on the first Saturday in November.

3) Plan Den Meetings

Decide how you want to structure and run your meetings. Bear in mind that little boys need to move around a lot – they find it very difficult to keep still for long, and need lots of physical expression. Here is an example of a meeting plan. You will be able to down load other meeting plans on the website at a later date.

12:55 – 1:10       Gathering activity (games, puzzles, discussion) until everyone arrives

1:10 – 1:15        Opening (Promise, Law of the Pack, pledge of allegiance, uniform inspection and prize for best turned out cub)

1:15 – 1:50        Den activities (usually 2 or 3 lasting 10 to 15 minutes)

crafts
discussion
games
work toward achievements

1:50 – 1:55        Closing (review activities, things to do at home, pass out awards)

1:55 – 2:10        Snack

4) Set the Den Rules

Get your boys to agree a code of behaviour – no talking when someone else is speaking, no insulting speech etc and get them to agree the consequences for breaking the code. This creates good relations within the den and gives them ownership – it is their den, after all!

5) Keeping Track

The Handbook provides a physical way to check achievements (parents are responsible for signing off on the work done by their son) but some families do things on their own.
You might find it useful to work with ScoutTrack

(www.ScoutTrack.com) so that parents can enter completed requirements directly instead of updating the handbooks and you having to review completed work at each meeting. The Pack subscribes to this software but not everyone uses it. If you want to use it, we can show you how this works (you need a password).

The Webmaster

can give you access.