The vastly different philosophies we adults and scouters profess

[NJCubScouter]

Moderator's Note: In case anyone is confused, the post to which Stosh was responding has been removed.

[Stosh]

So why is my post still there?

[NJCubScouter]

So why is my post still there?

Is that a typo for "Please remove my post?"

 

I always remove posts on the request of the poster.

 

You don't have to say the Please part, unless you want to be Courteous.

 

(If you do make the request, I will remove everyhing since the deleted post.)

Edited December 11, 2016 by NJCubScouter

[blw2]

In general, teenagers do want to learn.  But they do not necessarily want to learn what "we" want them to learn, when "we" want them to learn it.  ("We" in that sentence meaning, whoever is trying to teach them something at any given time.)  Which is what resulted in this thread, because a Scout who is an Instructor in blw2's troop has difficulty getting his "students" to pay attention to him.  

exactly right!

[Eagledad]

Putting on my human behavior hat here; Blw2 and NJ are exactly right, teenagers learn what the want to learn. The way the human brain works, at least the male human brain, is that it absorbs everything it observes until puberty. In fact my child psychologist Professor friend (also a SM) says that we males learn almost 90% of our behavior by age 13 simply by who we watched. And that is why Scouting is a wonderful teaching program when the unit bases growth from watching role models in action.

 

To this discussion, when the brain passes through puberty, the natural learning from just observing dramatically decreases and the brain starts to act proactively from what it learned. In other words, learning by observing is no longer the primary means of growth. The primary means of growth after puberty comes from active rational analyzing of situations. Basically that means we learn by our experiences or by proactively planning a change to the environment for our ambitions. In other words, the post pubescent brain only learns what it wants to learn, as apposed to the pubescent brain learns simply by watching. A post pubescent brain in nature grows when it wants to change the present status.

 

The reason so many troops struggle with older scouts is the adults set the vision of how older scouts should behave. Part of the problem is adults think of themselves a the main teachers and providers of the scouts; babysitters. So they project that on to the older scouts. Which is fine if the adults handed the responsibility of growth over to the older scouts. But growth of behavior and learning scouts skills is not the same thing. The adults push the older scout to just teach the First Class skills basics without consideration of how scouts actually grow in the troop program. So the older scouts are just repeating their first two or three years of boring skills lectures, which doesn't require any stimulation by creative rational analyzing of the situation. It doesn't stimulate growth. And the young scouts sit in a boring class watching boring instructor that less desire to be there than the young scouts.

 

Because their older scouts are bored and leaving the program, many troops try to build the program so the scouts is basically finished by age 14 with the Eagle. But in the human psychology world, that is about the age when the scout has become a man and is ready to take on real responsibility. His brain wants that responsibility because it desires more stimulus of growth.

 

Most here who still read my posts have heard me say that the quality of a unit is best measured by the quality of the older scouts. That is because the younger scouts (prepubescent) by nature learn their behavior in the troop by watching the older scouts (post pubescent). Considering that older scouts learn only by their experiences or drive to change the current situation, Scouts at all ages in the troop are measurably more mature when the troop gives older scouts the freedom to be proactively creative with the managing the troop.

 

So to blw2 and NJ's point, the more independence we adults give the older scouts to be creative and make decisions on managing the troop program, the more all the scouts will grow from the experience. And the more they will enjoy the troop experience.

 

Barry