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Thanks for correcting my terminology... your corrections are well....correct! As for the scout who went from Tenderfoot to First Class, he has been in our troop for over 3 years, and had just few items in each rank to complete, till camp this year there was no fire under him and he did not attend all the events .. sports and other outside events were more important, our policy is not to push, we let the scout and his parents decide how far he wanted to go. Now his mom tells me he is contacting eagle merit badge counselors. Interestingly, in most of the pictures I took of the scouts around the camp sight, he is in the background, scout book in hand. For this scout and the others that moved in rank, it was because we sent them to brownsea events. So THEY DID THE WORK hurrahhhh!!!

Just wanted to thank everyone for all their advice. We had a great time, with a VERY steep learning curve. The boys tried to convince us that they had a daily siesta time between the last merit badge 3 till dinner 6 Being the mom's that we are, this did not sound right, so we kicked them out to various free time activities. Proud to announce that with 14 boys, we passed off 47 merit badges, two incompletes and had 5 boys move onto next rank one boy jumped from tenderfoot to first class! We had them out there with their compasses orientering that course for hours! By the end of the week they were very proud of themselves and their accomplishments. We will volunteer again next year, at the boys request. Thanks again

I am so thrilled with all the ideas and sage advice. My concern is the idle hands becoming the devil's playground. Our SPL will not be arriving until Wed, we do have others who can step into leadership - which I will mention to them. There are a few who will try to see which rules they can successfully "bend" when they have idle moments. Those are the ones I wanted to keep active, I liked the idea of having an area set up for them to come to on their own. I also feel "relieved" that I do not have to be a mother to them. Keep sharing your advice, I leave on the 27th. Thanks Sue

Myself and another mom have volunteered to go to summer camp. I personally have never been to a summer camp, so I have no experience to draw from. I have taken lots of ideas from the forum so far, but am looking for ideas to keep those boys that need to be busy during their down time. Someone told me there was a book available about fun things to do with scouting skills. Any suggestions will be appreciated.