Question on little brother attending Tiger Cub meetings

[scrapperlisa]

We are new to cub scouting. My first grader is in Tiger Cubs. We also have a 3 year old son. My husband works nights, so the only way my older son can attend Tiger Cubs is if I take him. We have no family nearby, and I don't trust babysitters, so I bring my 3 yr old along too. I asked the cubmaster at the first meeting if that was OK, and he said the Tiger Cubs are for families, and my younger son is more than welcome. However we don't feel very welcome.

 

When we attend den and pack meetings, my 3 yr old acts like your average 3 yr old and is slightly disruptive. I spend most of my time with him to the side keeping him busy and hopefully quiet with other activities or toys. He thinks he is part of the den and wants to participate in everything. He wears a "Little Scout Buddy" t-shirt to the meetings and thinks it is his uniform. He even recited the Cub Scout Promise to me yesterday, which totally amazed me, as he learned it just by overhearing it from his older brother. If the boys are doing a craft or activity, he wants to do it too. Unfortunately, he is never able to participate, because they only bring supplies for the 6 boys in the den, and never include him in anything. It was like pulling teeth to get a scrap piece of paper for him one night when everyone was coloring.

 

The Den Leader shocked me recently by saying he would prefer it if I would just drop my older son off alone for the meetings, which are usually at the Den Leader's house, because he does not want my younger son there. I know the Tiger Cub requirements are that a parent must attend with the child, and we have never missed a meeting. I don't feel right leaving my son at someone's house. All the other parents are there for the meetings, but none of them have toddlers with them. I have felt very left out of our den activities. The other parents have all taken turns planning meetings, but no one includes us on planning anything, and I think it is because of my having my toddler there. I am thinking of asking to be transferred to a different den which has a female den leader and other moms with toddlers. He'll be a Wolf Cub soon, so I won't "have to" attend meetings with him, but I still think 2nd grade is awfully young and would like to attend meetings with him and my almost-4 yr old next school year. I recently volunteered for a pack committee position and I want to remain active with my son's pack.

 

What do you think? How do you deal with little siblings at meetings? Are they generally welcomed or ostracized? Was our Den Leader out of line for asking me to just drop my Tiger Cub off alone at the meetings?

 

[AdvanceOn]

Here's my two-cents worth --

 

It isn't the most optimal to have a toddler at meetings but the fact is it happens all the time. It's the only way families can participate in scouting. Your situation isn't that unusual.

 

Do you take plenty of things for your 3 year old to do? It really isn't up to the den leaders to provide activities and supplies for him. It's great that he feels like he is part of the den but he's not. Maybe you could find out what the activity is in advance and have similar activities/supplies for your 3 year old.

 

You should NOT send your Tiger son to meetings alone. It is very specific that a parent or adult partner needs to be there. Is there anyone else who could take the adult partner role for you? - it has to be someone over 18. It doesn't sound like it from your post but thought I'd ask.

 

Sounds like you might want to talk with the den leader about your situation and try to work something out. Even though the Cubmaster said it would be okay this leader may have different beliefs. And I would bet that the CM didn't even talk to the DL about your situation.

[OneHour]

scrapperlisa ... first of all, welcome.

 

Your situation is not uncommon. It occurs alot in a single-parent family. My current wolf den has one mom who brings her 3-years old with her to the den meeting. As long as you have something for the sibling to do and keep him/her busy then it's okay. Alot of time, when the sibling is being disruptive, the parent usually takes the sibling out of the room and other parents help the cub scout with his craft. You shouldn't expect the Den leader (Den helper in this case) to provide for your young one as well. After all this is for your older son and his cub scout friends. If they provide for your younger one, then great, but if they don't, then it's okay. In Tiger cub year, it is less structured and more playing; as a result, the Tigers are a handful already and adding a 3-year old into the mix may not add any more relief to the Den Leader. It's really up to the Den parents. Cub scouting is a family affair. The family interacts with each other outside of the Pack/Den meeting; however, in the context of the Pack/Den, they are really referring the opportunity for the parent(s) to interact with the boy if the outside opportunity does not present itself.

 

So my advice is to bring along something to keep your 3-years old busy for the whole hour and if he is disruptive then take him out of the room until he has calmed down. I'm fairly sure that everyone will be understanding. Now, dropping your son off may not be a good idea if he is the only one without a parent! But then again, other parents may do the same in the Wolf year. Our situation is different. In our wolf year, the parents simply were too lazy to attend the Den meeting with their son and so they don't want take the boy even if the boy is interested in Cub Scouting. It came to a point where there were only 2-3 boys out of 9. I simply told them that I and my assistant Den Leader will be here and all that they have to do is to drop their sons off with one condition: they have to help out at least one month (when their son is the Denner). It worked wonderfully. Of the 9 boys, I graduated 5 of the same boys into Scouting two months ago. The other 4 moved throughout our times as cub scouting and the great thing about it is that we usually have 7-9 boys every time ... and we had fun!

 

Good luck.

 

OneHour(This message has been edited by OneHour)

[fotoscout]

Welcome Scrapperlisa,

 

First off, if youre doing Tiger Cubs and someone isnt being disruptive then youre doing it wrong. Tigers, parents, and siblings can all be disruptive, and in turn each will be. So maybe you should look at the tone of his meetings and make a decision based on that. Remember, the boys should be having FUN!

 

Tigers is a Parent-Partner program, its designed like that. Hes is doing you and the others a disservice by suggesting that any of boys be there without a parent.

 

I never have just enough materials to go around for a project; there were always extra materials except when a particular piece to the project was expensive. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, perhaps hes being too thrifty with his funds. You might suggest to him that youd be willing to pay for the extra materials.Activities involving your younger son are a little different story. If the activity is such the younger boy can stand beside or behind your older son and mimic him thats probably fine. However in a group activity that has the tigers interacting with each other, it would be unfair to have one of Tigers interact with a 3 year old. Most of the parents bring something with them for the younger child to do during this period.

 

Everyone handles this issue differently, my position on sibs is this; siblings are more than welcome, boys, girls it doesnt make a difference. Materials for sibs to participate are usually available but remember that the parents are paying dues which should be spent on supplies for the boys not sibs. Also, as the leader, my contact time with the boys is limited. If I take time to work with the sib, then one of the boys got a little less of my time.

 

Having said that, the sibs go home from my meeting with beads, patches, stars, ribbons, pictures, whatever, and they are as excited as the boys. Your Cubmaster was correct, and you may want to have him talk to the Tiger Leader. Scouting is for families and you are at the first step. If there is another den in you pack you may want to check it out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[scrapperlisa]

Thank you for your advice. Yes, I know my younger son is not part of the den and I would not expect them to spend any funds on supplies for him. I try to come to every meeting with activities/snacks/whatever to keep my younger son busy and quiet during the meeting. Sometimes he does stand next to his big brother and watch/mimic what he is doing. I do not allow him to do most of the Tiger Cub den activities unless it is something simple like going on a walk to collect leaves. He does not do much interacting with the other Tigers. But he does like to sit next to them. I am very quick to take him out of the room if he is being loud or running or being disruptive. If I dropped my Tiger off, he would be the only one there without a parent. I don't have anyone else to be his adult partner. I liked your suggestions. I think communication is a big part of the problem, and I will work on my end of that. Plus I think I will see about switching to a new den next year. I hope that request doesn't ruffle too many feathers. Right now we have 18 Tigers in 3 dens of 6.

[scrapperlisa]

BTW, this line made me feel a lot better:

 

"First off, if youre doing Tiger Cubs and someone isnt being disruptive then youre doing it wrong."

 

Another thing I wanted to add is that I hate when the parents provide cookies and juice or other sugary snacks in the middle of the meeting. You can just sit back and watch all the kids go BONKERS after that. It's too hard to say "no cookies" to my kids when all the other kids are eating them too. I haven't brought snacks because I am never included on the planning of the meetings. I barely even know when they will be. Usually I get a phone call the night before or even the day of, telling me when and where the meeting is. Communication is definitely lacking in my den. I guess I need to speak up myself and see if I can change things.

[fotoscout]

Snacks should always be left for the end of the meeting. My den meetings don't start untill 5:30, so we don't do snacks, it's not required.

 

As for location of meetings, it sounds like each parent is taking a turn hosting the meeting. Thats a good thing! But, in two years when you're the Tiger Leader you can do the following.... at your parents meeting in the begining of the year have each parent sign up for an achievment, put dates on it, make copies, and mail it. Poof....no last minute phone calls.

 

Good Luck

[mk9750]

I think AdvanceOn hit the home run. I would place an emphasis in his thought that if the only way for your older son to participate is having his lttle brother along with him, you should be the one providing the activity to keep him occupied and away from the Den. Scouting is designed to be an age appropriate activity at most every age level. The BSA has not attempted to provide a program for 3 year olds yet, so if he must be there, you should find a way to keep him from being a disruption from the Den. Not always easy, I know. The Den Leader probably ought to be more understanding of the situation, too.

 

One other thing I though I'd throw in. You mentioned your desire to accompany your son to Den meetings when he becomes a Wolf. Unless you hold a Den Leader or Asistant Den Leader position, I think that this is probably a mistake. Most kids respond well to being out from under Mom and Dad's wings about the age of 7 - 8. As a Den leader in the past, I've seen two cases where parents couldn't let go of a boy who is ready to participate in the minor independence Cub Scouting provides, and from the perspective of outside that family, it was easy to see the harm that was done. I would certainly make sure I have met and are very comfortable with the Den Leader and Assistant Den Leader, and I would make sure I was welcome to drop in on a meeting whenever I wanted, and do so from time to time a couple of times in the first month or so. But I think in the long run, your son will be much better off if you alow him to oppurtunity to experience Scouting the way it was designed. This is one of the big points I made when trying to recruit Den Leaders. If you want to be a part of your son's Scouting life, the best seat in the house is as a Den Leader!

 

Good luck. I know you, your Cub, and your Cub - to - be will be just dandy!

 

Mark

[fotoscout]

Endless creatively, endless imagination, endless resource, endless support, future leaders, they are called parents. As long as they follow instruction, and defer to the den leader, (which mine all do, sometimes with a gentle reminder), they are always welcome.

 

Were doing the Council Scout Show this weekend. Ive had to do almost nothing. I come home at night and find material on my doorstep, the phone rings and someone says, Its done. Together we bring the kids a stronger, better, more interesting program then I could bring them if I and my asst. were doing this alone.

 

[scrapperlisa]

You make some good points. I will definitely take a hard look at myself to see if I am not ready to let go. My son is 6 years old. One of the reasons I was considering going to the Wolf meetings was that at our last pack meeting, the female Tiger den leader begged parents to keep coming to Wolf den meetings next year. She said it was manageable now with Tigers only because all the parents are there, and can't imagine staying on track without a lot of parents attending the meetings. This lady is a schoolteacher, so she is used to handling lots of kids, but felt she needed help.

[fotoscout]

Some one may scream at me but I'll go ahead and say it anyway... We are all Leaders just Leaders. A Leader has no spare time, a Leader grows to have no Life (just joking), and a Leader has no gender.(This message has been edited by fotoscout)

[scrapperlisa]

I guess I said she was female so no one would mistake her for my den's leader. I think dens are very different depending on who is the leader, and what is their gender and personality type. The dens led by men with lots of dads attending seem very different from the dens led by females with lots of mom participation. Even though they are following the same program. Maybe it's just that our den leader and most of the dads in our den work very long hours and barely have the time to squeeze in cub scout stuff. Not that I don't work long hours too. But the dens with lots of moms in them just seem more organized and seem to have more fun. Not trying to stereotype all men and women here. But that's just the way it is in our pack.

[OneHour]

scrapperlisa, I would have to take exception to your observation. I'm a male den leader and I would have to say that my Den is having a blast (my 2nd son's den that is). I took over my older son's Den from a wonderful lady who was trying so hard to get the Den organized (bless her heart) and we had probably the most fun in our Pack of 14 Dens! Yes ... we sang, we did arts & crafts, we sang more, we tells jokes, we sang some more, we played, we camped (about 10 times from Wolf to graduation), etc. I would agree with you with regards to gender (in terms of a Den with a male den leader tends to do alot more outdoor stuffs (such as camping, hiking, etc.)). One of our Dens that happens to have another wonderful female leader has never camped once and they are now 1st year Webelos. On the flip side, we have another Den that is lead by a female leader and they attended all of the Pack's campouts and then some! The difference that I notice is that the Dens that have fun and stayed strong are the ones that are lead by TRAINED leaders! Every boy deserved a well-trained leader!

 

By the way, my take is that you should fully participate with your son from Tiger and on; however, as each year goes by, you let go of the rope a little more. By the time that he is in boy scout, he will be on his own and you still be there but only in a supporting role! I was so proud of my oldest when he told me to stay home so that he can go to his first boyscout campout alone! Now all that I have to do is to convince my wife of that!

 

Cheers,

 

OneHour

 

[fotoscout]

Scrapper your observation is correct. Men do this CS thing differently than do woman. But not all men do it the same way and of course not all women do it the same way. My little show is much like OneHours. And as he suggested, I am the only fully trained leader in the pack. None of the women in our pack sing with their kids, and none of them yell and cheer like we do. But they are conscientious and do a great job.

 

Ive also noticed one other thing, if a dad is a den leader, the other dads come out to be with their sons. When a woman is the den leader, the dads seem to be more hesitant to come out with their sons. It might just be representative of our culture.

 

[dsteele]

Hey Scrapper, welcome to the forums!

 

If the other den is in the same pack and has young siblings attending, why not request to be in that den? I assume your son has friends in his den and may not want to move, but kids that age tend to make friends quickly and the move shouldn't be too disruptive. They're probably doing something different with the siblings and could add your son.

 

It wouldn't effect your son's status in the program in any official way.

 

I'm not about to dive into this male/female issue that just popped up.

 

DS