Soliciting ideas : how do you notice, and recognize, scoutly behavior?

[qwazse]

I agree that "trust games" are not appropriate with youth. They may be barely appropriate with adults. Look up "win-all-you-can" on the Woodbadge forum.

The best of these are classic disaster-drill/rescuse scenarios. Really good Klondike derbies should be set up this way. No single patrol has the resources to complete whatever task they've been assigned. (Usually they find their resources at "air drops" on opposite sides of camp, and they open their "crates" by demonstrating a skill or showing patrol spirit.) But, by delivering resources (which usually involves some sort of rope work) to every other patrol, they can complete the task. Observers award points based on skill and teamwork (both within- and across- patrols).

That's why I like wilderness backpacking. As a complete exercise (with each patrol assigned a different hike from a common insertion to a troop rendesvous, adults who won't correct them until they've gone a mile off course, etc ...) it demands a level of selflessness that young scouts are not used to giving.

[Cambridgeskip]

Bit late to the discussion but a couple of things to add.

Like Qwaze said, small thankyous and comments for when scouts have done things well. An example we have a new adult volunteerinng with us at the moment. She's been with us a few months. Naturally the scouts have gone through the stages they always do with a new adult. First they were a bit wary. That's been and gone. They she was their favourite. That's been and gone. Now they're pushing her boundaries a bit. Standard. Anyway last week I noticed one of our patrol leaders quite specifically being supportive and giving her advice on how to get one of our particularly gobby ones to be quiet for a moment. "keep him separated from that one." I made sure to quietly nod and smile at him and make sure he knew he'd done well.

We also have a year long inter patrol competition where they rack points up throughout the year. Some of the points are for those easy to measure things. Nights on camp, badges earned etc. We also though award points for random acts of kindness, helpfulness, team work etc.

An example again from just this week. We are allowed to use the playing field of a nearby school during our meetings. While out on the field one of our scouts found somebody's door key. He picked it up and rather than handing it to me he thought to hand it to his PL as he knew her mum works in the office at that school. 5 points for that patrol, both helpful and showing enough thought to deal with it competently.

[willray]

22 hours ago, Cambridgeskip said:

...We also have a year long inter patrol competition where they rack points up throughout the year. Some of the points are for those easy to measure things. Nights on camp, badges earned etc. We also though award points for random acts of kindness, helpfulness, team work etc....

So -- We also have a year-long interpatrol competition, and it's part of the reason that I decided that some principled research in this area was warranted.  I'm convinced that as we implement it, a year-long competition does almost nothing to reinforce any Scoutly habits/mindset that we'd like it to.  To be sure, we have one campout where the competition is a primary focus, and the scouts have fun.  Unfortunately, the potential reward is separated from the actions by such a large period of time (days, is really too much) that it doesn't really trigger the reward-satisfaction biochemistry loop that's really helpful for reinforcing behavior.  Also, as @The Latin Scot pointed out, the foregone-conclusion front-runners separate from the rest of the patrols so early that everyone else pretty much takes a "why should we bother" attitude for most of the year.   It's deeply embedded in our troop's culture, but, in many respects I think it actually works against our interests in developing thoughtful young citizens.

I'm convinced that there are more effective ways to do the competition, recognition and reward, and I'm hoping that units with ideas that work well for them will chime in with what they're doing successfully, or unsuccessfully.  At the worst, if we can identify the kinds of pitfalls my troop has encountered with our year-long competition, that could be useful for other units trying to navigate their way to the best outcomes.

I can say, in addition to the time-scale, I think one of the largest things that works against our year-long competition being effective, is that our "scorekeeper" only reports scores to the troop/patrols on a quarterly basis.  I think possibly if there was immediate (same day/same campout/maybe weekly troop-meeting) feedback, this would improve the effectiveness of our competition, but, I haven't managed to nudge things in that direction yet.  I also think that possibly, scoring "little stuff" at each event/meeting/etc, but then doing an electoral-college thing and aggregating the "little stuff" scores into a single "one point for the winning patrol" score for each event, might balance things against the frontrunner running away with a guaranteed win so early in the season.  Our current scheme of scoring everything, for an entire year, almost guarantees that the largest patrol will always win, since they're going to be the most consistent performer event-to-event, even if they're not the best performer at any event.  Again, I haven't been able to test alternatives, so I'm hoping to get insight from other troops that might be doing this better.

[willray]

23 hours ago, Eagledad said:

I don't know, at some point the scouts have to be left on their own to ponder the dreams of adventure. Adults inducing more structure can overwhelm the natural learning from the patrol method. 

Competition among boys is natural, so it's really more about the adults not getting in the way. Adults can and should encourage more opportunities of competition, but I found, more often than not,  that the adult suggestions didn't appeal to the scouts...

I believe I have reasonable evidence that at least some of what I'm trying to do, resonates with the scouts.  We'll know more after a year or so of testing ideas and seeing how our PLC morphs them into their own creations.

That being said, like Le Corbusier, I could design grand and perfect schemes for Scout Values-reinforcing activities in my head all day long, but it's the details of implementation and practicality of whether the scouts actually find them interesting and valuable to engage in, that makes any of this worth doing.  That's why I think it's worth looking at other's experience for ideas that actually work (and for pitfalls) with their scouts.   I'm overall quite pleased with how well my troop does, and even if this is seen through somewhat tinted glasses, think we generally come up smelling like roses when we're put in the context of interacting with most other troops.  Still, we can do better, and if we can do better, maybe we can help others do better by cataloging ideas that help us get there.

Will

[qwazse]

30 minutes ago, willray said:

... I can say, in addition to the time-scale, I think one of the largest things that works against our year-long competition being effective, is that our "scorekeeper" only reports scores to the troop/patrols on a quarterly basis....

Oh, that's really ineffective. You're not having anything like a standard year-long competition. At the end of each day, patrols should know what points are being credited to them and why, and they should have a good idea of where they stand on the "leader board."  You could have a traveling totem that at courts of honor, would move to a winning patrol for that term. So, time-scale might be your problem if your patrols reconfigure every year (that's why suggest recognition at every CoH, which should be happening more than yearly), but how you all are announcing results is the number one issue.

21 minutes ago, willray said:

I believe I have reasonable evidence that at least some of what I'm trying to do, resonates with the scouts.  We'll know more after a year or so of testing ideas and seeing how our PLC morphs them into their own creations. ...

As youth age out and new ones come in, you will find that what works today won't work next year. So, definitely your PLC is the place for after action review. Tell them you got some feedback from strangers on the internet, and listen to their responses. What they think is worthwhile, implement; what they think is dumb, put on the shelf and maybe bring it up with the next class of PLs.

[willray]

23 hours ago, qwazse said:

I agree that "trust games" are not appropriate with youth. They may be barely appropriate with adults. Look up "win-all-you-can" on the Woodbadge forum.

I'm painfully familiar with win-all-you-can (and for anyone who's not, please don't go look it up).   Still, I don't think I'd argue that all trust-games are inappropriate for youth.  The spider-web is a trust-game*, and really, most good patrol-forming activities are forms of trust games as well.  The "force struggle, so that they can grow out of the struggle by seeing where they could have better-applied Scouting values" is a version of this as well.  Most of the advice in this area is just tossed out as a "just do it", without much guidance regarding what works and what doesn't, and some people clearly latch on to the wrong bits of the idea and generate abominations like win-all-you-can.   I think there's room for better ideas that build up and reinforce, rather than tear down.

Will

[*] only quite loosely in the economics sense

[Cambridgeskip]

55 minutes ago, willray said:

So -- We also have a year-long interpatrol competition, and it's part of the reason that I decided that some principled research in this area was warranted.  I'm convinced that as we implement it, a year-long competition does almost nothing to reinforce any Scoutly habits/mindset that we'd like it to.  To be sure, we have one campout where the competition is a primary focus, and the scouts have fun.  Unfortunately, the potential reward is separated from the actions by such a large period of time (days, is really too much) that it doesn't really trigger the reward-satisfaction biochemistry loop that's really helpful for reinforcing behavior.  Also, as @The Latin Scot pointed out, the foregone-conclusion front-runners separate from the rest of the patrols so early that everyone else pretty much takes a "why should we bother" attitude for most of the year.   It's deeply embedded in our troop's culture, but, in many respects I think it actually works against our interests in developing thoughtful young citizens.

I'm convinced that there are more effective ways to do the competition, recognition and reward, and I'm hoping that units with ideas that work well for them will chime in with what they're doing successfully, or unsuccessfully.  At the worst, if we can identify the kinds of pitfalls my troop has encountered with our year-long competition, that could be useful for other units trying to navigate their way to the best outcomes.

I can say, in addition to the time-scale, I think one of the largest things that works against our year-long competition being effective, is that our "scorekeeper" only reports scores to the troop/patrols on a quarterly basis.  I think possibly if there was immediate (same day/same campout/maybe weekly troop-meeting) feedback, this would improve the effectiveness of our competition, but, I haven't managed to nudge things in that direction yet.  I also think that possibly, scoring "little stuff" at each event/meeting/etc, but then doing an electoral-college thing and aggregating the "little stuff" scores into a single "one point for the winning patrol" score for each event, might balance things against the frontrunner running away with a guaranteed win so early in the season.  Our current scheme of scoring everything, for an entire year, almost guarantees that the largest patrol will always win, since they're going to be the most consistent performer event-to-event, even if they're not the best performer at any event.  Again, I haven't been able to test alternatives, so I'm hoping to get insight from other troops that might be doing this better.

Ours can see the points go up (and very occasionally down) almost by the minute. We have a white board in the main hall and points are added as we go along. They literally see it being marked up and who is in the lead as any given evening goes on. I don't think you have the Young Leader scheme your side of the pond but we use a YL to specifically keep the points up to date as the evening or camp goes along. It creates some stiff competition!

[qwazse]

1 hour ago, willray said:

I'm painfully familiar with win-all-you-can (and for anyone who's not, please don't go look it up).   Still, I don't think I'd argue that all trust-games are inappropriate for youth.  The spider-web is a trust-game*, and really, most good patrol-forming activities are forms of trust games as well.  The "force struggle, so that they can grow out of the struggle by seeing where they could have better-applied Scouting values" is a version of this as well.  Most of the advice in this area is just tossed out as a "just do it", without much guidance regarding what works and what doesn't, and some people clearly latch on to the wrong bits of the idea and generate abominations like win-all-you-can.   I think there's room for better ideas that build up and reinforce, rather than tear down.

Will

[*] only quite loosely in the economics sense

I make a distinction between team challenges and trust-games (not to be confused with trust-falls). Trust games require you to depend on an opponent to advance your mutual standing. Team challenges allow you to be sporting - or not. One team might win a challenge, but another team might have a member who demonstrates unparalleled levels of sportsmanship. We really don't care if the same team consistently wins challenges -- if indeed that team has remarkable skills. But, in the long run, we want good sportsmanship to spread across the league. So much so, that unsportsmanlike conduct would lead to suspension/ejection from the game ... possibly even the league.

Fine point: I've encouraged the use of suspensions only for a behavior that 1) threatens the safety of the scout or others, 2) is willful and unseemly, and 3) the scout has no chance of changing if we deny discipline. It really stinks when it becomes that serious, and has little to do with the positive reinforcement you want to apply. But, I think it goes along in the sense that the lives of 11-17 year olds are so volatile that even your most "scout-like" individual one day may need strict discipline the next. When a scout breaks bad, don't dismiss (or let others dismiss) your point system. A high score might be evidence to a wayward scout that he has it in him do better if he decides to come back. A suspension might be evidence to other scouts to not think too highly of their points because "But for the grace of God, there go I."

[Eagledad]

This discussion went so far off in the weeds that I'm not even going to look for the ball.

Trust Game? Patrol Method is the trust game. It is the game for the purpose. Adults don't see it so much today because they don't allow the scouts to push it to the stress of scouts challenging each other.

The four stages of team building are forming, storming, norming and performing. Forming is easy, throw a bunch of guys into a patrol. Storming is simply the stage where the members fall into agreement for their responsibility to the team for reaching the goal, or goals within the expected time fame. The goals should be strenuous enough to force members to understand the need of each member taking a responsibility. Done correctly, the scouts find themselves challenged with using the Scout Law because in most cases, pride has to take a back seat to accept the responsibility. Replacing pride with humility can be a struggle. 

Nothing beat "expectations" and "time" for pushing scouts outside of their behavior comfort zone. Expectations and time became my favorite goto techniques to push scouts in growth. It was how learned. One example is in the old days, patrols were used to daily inspections. Those inspections require continued camp custodial actions. All tents are neat and tidy with all sleeping bags rolled and clothing put away in packs. Does anybody realize the challenge of that one task for this age group. We used to have reveille, which was early enough to make getting out of the sleeping bag hard, but a must because that meant the patrol had a very limited time to their cooking, kp, and tidy up each tent campsite required a full effort for the team. Failure meant a bad inspection score and maybe even dirty dishes for lunch.

I didn't realize it then, but scouting taught me how to be organized, or suffer from pressure from my patrol mates. My kids laugh that I have a reason for when and how I do the simplist tasks just to be more efficient. 

I like a discussion of ideas to amplify growth, but I think we need to keep it within of the normal troop program. Competition and building team trust are more difficult today because the culture today identifies stress of growth as a form of abuse. So, making this stuff fun is even more of a requirement.  But it's worth the discovery.

Barry

[willray]

57 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

This discussion went so far off in the weeds that I'm not even going to look for the ball.

Heh - it's all helpful from my point of view.  In an economics sense, your tootsie-roll-box at the campsite is a form of trust game, so it's possibly helpful to think about other formulations of the same underlying principle.

Usually (in the economics sense) in a competition, trust-games are better at pointing out sub-optimal behavior, than at encouraging good behavior, but It's additionally (possibly only academically) interesting to think about whether there are trust-game based competitions that positively reinforce good behavior.

At the end of the day, my goal is to collect ideas that units could try, to increase the day-to-day living of Scoutly values, and to catalog some specific implementation details that empirically work, or that should be avoided.   "Use the patrol method" is great, at least for relationships with the patrol-team, but it's not terribly specific, and it's obvious that a lot of units struggle with it.  "If you're going to do year-long inter-patrol competitions, provide daily feedback on the points awarded and the standings" is specific, and while some might think it's obvious, clearly, at least my troop hasn't figured that out.  I'd bet that others are in the same boat.

So, I'm happy to hear, and discuss any thoughts anyone has regarding what has worked with their units.

 

58 minutes ago, Eagledad said:

Nothing beat "expectations" and "time" for pushing scouts outside of their behavior comfort zone. Expectations and time became my favorite goto techniques to push scouts in growth. It was how learned. One example is in the old days, patrols were used to daily inspections. Those inspections require continued camp custodial actions. All tents are neat and tidy with all sleeping bags rolled and clothing put away in packs. Does anybody realize the challenge of that one task for this age group. We used to have reveille, which was early enough to make getting out of the sleeping bag hard, but a must because that meant the patrol had a very limited time to their cooking, kp, and tidy up each tent campsite required a full effort for the team. Failure meant a bad inspection score and maybe even dirty dishes for lunch.

This is a bit afield of the idea-harvesting, but, I'm curious what advice you have for dealing with expectations that aren't met.  I'm styling my particular experiment here in terms of Scoutly Values reinforcing activities such as campfire-program content, scoutmaster-minute-and-thirty discussions, and games/competitions that could be embedded in the normal program (even if it doesn't look like a game, like your Tootsie Pops), but, I'm also generally interested in how to maximize the utility of the normal program/methods as well.

One challenge that I see (and for which our boys troop has a couple specific exemplars) are scouts (and patrols) that "just don't care".  You set the expectation that they will be up at 7:00AM, prepare their meal, break camp and be on the trail by 8:00, and you get a scout who simply refuses to get up.  No amount of talking to, etc, from his patrol leader, SPL, or even SM, gets him out of his tent.  When he finally does get up, he goes over to where his patrol is just finishing cooking breakfast, grabs the plate of pancakes and takes one bite out of each one.  When he finishes eating, he just stuffs his dirty dishes into the patrol mess-kit (that the rest of the patrol just finished washing).  By the time the rest of the patrol and troop have broken down camp and are ready to move, he hasn't even started to pack.

This is an extreme example, but it's one of the things that I, personally, really struggle with.  Professionally, I do a lot of mentoring (slightly older) youth, but I get to do it in a capacity where my expectations have teeth.  I'm not sure how to implement teeth in most Scouting expectations, and the teeth that are the most readily available, don't seem entirely appropriate.  The scouts that have the most trouble being good patrol members, are the ones who need scouting the most, so saying "you blew it, you don't get to X" just deprives them of whatever growth they could have gained.  You seem to have some wisdom in this area that I lack, so I'd appreciate your insights into how to push patrols to meet uncomfortable expectations and actually have the scouts try to achieve them.

[Eagledad]

16 hours ago, willray said:

This is a bit afield of the idea-harvesting, but, I'm curious what advice you have for dealing with expectations that aren't met.  I'm styling my particular experiment here in terms of Scoutly Values reinforcing activities such as campfire-program content, scoutmaster-minute-and-thirty discussions, and games/competitions that could be embedded in the normal program (even if it doesn't look like a game, like your Tootsie Pops), but, I'm also generally interested in how to maximize the utility of the normal program/methods as well.

Great Question because so few troops look at their program in this way. They have expectations but don't really analyze why the scouts aren't meeting them. Instead of stepping back, reflecting and trying something new, they react by intruding and pushing. Now, I'm not saying adults should never provide input to boost the program, scouts simply run out of ideas. But, when a scout has to be continually told to wear his uniform properly, something is a miss. Scouts need self motivation to grow, not the threat of adult intimidation. 

The reason I rather used mixed age patrols instead of same age patrols is that we used both of them and the growth of scouts in same age patrols was unquestionably slower. We didn't care which style we used, we just wanted productive growth. We were able to observe the two types of patrols side-by-side and the growth of young scouts with continued older scout role models excelled over the new scouts who waited for Troop Guides and adults to push them along. So, we made a change to our program, a big change. We mixed the new scouts into the existing patrols as fast as possible. 

But we tried to evaluate every little part of our program like that. What worked and what didn't work. Maybe we were obsessive about it, I don't know. But we were doing something right, the troop grew from 15 scouts to 100 scouts in five years and we didn't even go looking for new scouts. And that was after loosing 50% of our new scouts the first couple years when we were learning. 

 

Quote

One challenge that I see (and for which our boys troop has a couple specific exemplars) are scouts (and patrols) that "just don't care".  You set the expectation that they will be up at 7:00AM, prepare their meal, break camp and be on the trail by 8:00, and you get a scout who simply refuses to get up.  No amount of talking to, etc, from his patrol leader, SPL, or even SM, gets him out of his tent.  When he finally does get up, he goes over to where his patrol is just finishing cooking breakfast, grabs the plate of pancakes and takes one bite out of each one.  When he finishes eating, he just stuffs his dirty dishes into the patrol mess-kit (that the rest of the patrol just finished washing).  By the time the rest of the patrol and troop have broken down camp and are ready to move, he hasn't even started to pack.

Yes, we live in different times. Youth today aren't used to disciplined structure that we were raised in, so they need A LOT more or different motivation to reach expectations. And frankly, different expectations.

When I was a scout, my SM was a pilot. He challenged all the patrols to complete against each other in inspections, skills competitions, and living by the Oath and Law. The patrol with the most points in six months would get a plane ride. That was some motivation. As a pilot myself, I made the same challenge as my mentor, and while the patrols put in some effort, it basically fell flat. It's not that they scouts weren't willing to compete, they just weren't into the same challenges. For one thing, youth today are used to instant gratification. Six months turned them off from the start. Also, skills are boring. When I was a youth, knots supported everything from tents to camp gadgets. Today everything is held together with bungie cords.

Yet, when the PLC came up with the idea of a Triathlon campout of hiking, biking and canoeing, through 16 different skills stations, ALL the scouts were all in. There was no plane ride for motivation, the pure fun of hiking biking and canoeing, (mostly biking) drew them to compete. That was not the adults idea, that was all scout. 

There is a quote somewhere by Badon Powell where he talks about the Scoutmaster being the older brother of the patrols. I think that is what he meant. Adults and older brothers think differently, have different motivations and different visions of adventure. The adults have to change hats and become big brothers to find the expectations that motivate today's scouts. I know that sounds simplistic, but if the adults don't find their motivation, the troop will struggle or become adult run. 

Side note: I got a call from the Pack of 30 Webelos that wanted to camp with us to see our troop in action. We knew nothing of this pack, but I told them about the Triathlon campout we were doing this weekend. However she would have to call the SPL because the PLC would only have 4 days to prepare for 30 Webelos and their parents to camp with us. I didn't know what the SPL would say, but he was up for it. The Webelos and their parents were so tired from Saturday's activities that they skipped Sunday breakfast to go home. We honestly weren't sure if they felt our troop was a bit too much and would join another troop. Silly us, all 30 scouts joined. 

 

Quote

This is an extreme example, but it's one of the things that I, personally, really struggle with.  Professionally, I do a lot of mentoring (slightly older) youth, but I get to do it in a capacity where my expectations have teeth.  I'm not sure how to implement teeth in most Scouting expectations, and the teeth that are the most readily available, don't seem entirely appropriate.  The scouts that have the most trouble being good patrol members, are the ones who need scouting the most, so saying "you blew it, you don't get to X" just deprives them of whatever growth they could have gained.  You seem to have some wisdom in this area that I lack, so I'd appreciate your insights into how to push patrols to meet uncomfortable expectations and actually have the scouts try to achieve them.

I think the best answer is to keep trying. Find motivations that appeal to the scouts. I mentioned how our scout learned how to work together in breaking camp in one hour. The motivation was stopping for some junk food on the way home. It is as simple as that. But as I said, they not only broke the one hour goal, they got better and better to where 80 scouts broke camp in 30 minutes. Once they got inertia to work better as a team, they kept going. Not only did they break camp faster, they complained less and helped each other more. You have no idea how much the influences younger scouts. For the older scout to just walk over to help you fold a tent and them move on means so much to them. Those young scouts grow up to be older scouts helping younger scouts. Role modeling really works. I still am amazed by it.

I didn't realize how big a deal the habits developed from breaking camp was until a trail guide we had on a backpacking trip commented that our crews were the fastest boy scout crews he had ever seen for breaking camp. He said the average crew took two hours where our took 20 minutes. He said our crews could sleep in a little the rest of the trip if we wanted because he would have to adjust his normal schedule.

Using that reward was a shot in the dark. Yes, stopping for junk food became a bit of a tradition, but it gave us so many benefits that we didn't mind. I'm sure I will come up with a lot of other things we learned along the way. But, if you can start tuning into your scouts world and find what gets them excited, I think you are clever enough to use that leverage to your advantage. 

One other example, our scouts were pretty good at annual planning. Annual planning was one of the first action items for the PLC after elections. Well, these things always took about 8 hours because scouts loose focus. I don't remember who thought of it, but we decided to combine a lock-in where after the planning is done, the scouts do all-night video games with all the pizza they could eat. Wow!, we finished our annul planning "IN 3 HOURS". And they got better each time after. Imagine 12 months of planning in 2 HOURS. Did we adults see that coming, NOOOO! Not only did the PLC Annual Planning Lock-in motivate the scouts to be more efficient with planning, the PLC was the envy of all the scouts. Scouts ran for office just for Annual Planning night. Of course they learned that PLC works very hard and the lock-in was more of a reward than a carrot. I challenge any troop to run a better annual planning session.

My advice is don't be satisfied with low performance. Keep trying new ideas. Some ideas stick, some don't. And respect your PLC as mature adults. If you respect them, they will work like the dickens for you. One example of that respect was a time I wanted to change our six month elections to one year elections. Every troop I visited with one year elections had very mature PLCs because the SPL had a year to lead. I learned through our own troop that the SPL needs about four months just to get his feet under him. That only gave us about 2 months with a productive SPL. Why not eight months instead. It made complete since to me. I proposed the idea to our PLC. I'm a pretty good sales man and can usually get what I want. But after laughing, they put the brakes on that idea. OK, another time. I spoiled my PLCs. Our PLCs averaged over 50 PLC meetings every six months, so I always had special treats waiting for them like cokes, chips, pizza. I respected their hard work, and they respected me by giving their best.

If I look back at my scoutmastering experience as successful, it was only because of luck. I tripped over most of our good ideas.

Barry

Edited March 21, 2019 by Eagledad

[qwazse]

16 hours ago, willray said:

... This is a bit afield of the idea-harvesting, but, I'm curious what advice you have for dealing with expectations that aren't met. 

... scouts (and patrols) that "just don't care".  You set the expectation that they will be up at 7:00AM, prepare their meal, break camp and be on the trail by 8:00, and you get a scout who simply refuses to get up.  No amount of talking to, etc, from his patrol leader, SPL, or even SM, gets him out of his tent.  When he finally does get up, he goes over to where his patrol is just finishing cooking breakfast, grabs the plate of pancakes and takes one bite out of each one.  When he finishes eating, he just stuffs his dirty dishes into the patrol mess-kit (that the rest of the patrol just finished washing).  By the time the rest of the patrol and troop have broken down camp and are ready to move, he hasn't even started to pack.

This is an extreme example, but it's one of the things that I, personally, really struggle with.  ...

@willray, stop struggling. This is a scout who should be suspended from your troop (at least from camp-outs) until he decides he wants to actually work in a patrol. His behavior is 1) unsanitary, therefore threatening the health and safety of others, 2) willful and unseemly, and 3) has no chance of changing if you deny him discipline. I assure you, games where you reward the other scouts for showing scout spirit -- no matter how rich the reward -- will not inspire this kid.

Let him and his parents know that up until now he has chosen to not be a scout (as in helpful, courteous). Your troop only has scouts. And until he chooses to be one -- just like he promises every time he gives an oath -- he's not welcome. You might have to insist that a parent join you adults and be prepared to haul the boy home at the first sign of misbehavior.

Now, be prepared to listen. There might be some bullying going on, and this is his way of protesting. So you may have more twisted threads to untangle. But you simply have no game until the boys decide that they want to be on the playing field.

P.S. - We had a scout who slept in a lot. No problem. He missed breakfast, and sometimes his tent was dropped for him with him in it. (Parents were fine with this, BTW.) He packed up and hauled off with his patrol without a complaint. He was a swell kid in so many other ways -- especially courteous and helpful. The guy's an Eagle scout now -- gainfully employed.

Edited March 21, 2019 by qwazse

[MattR]

6 hours ago, Eagledad said:

My advice is don't be satisfied with low performance. Keep trying new ideas. Some ideas stick, some don't.

I wish someone had made this clear when I started as SM. Now, it's what I did anyway, but I always felt like I was doing something wrong.

5 hours ago, qwazse said:

This is a scout who should be suspended from your troop (at least from camp-outs) until he decides he wants to actually work in a patrol.

@willray, I agree with this. There aren't many scouts like this but there are a few that figure out that since you won't discipline them so there are no rules. I suppose some of them are around because they have to be. The rest read Machiavelli. Anyway, sometimes negative consequences are the only thing that motivates people. You still need to be fair and up front about it, but there needs to be a line.

[WisconsinMomma]

Love this topic and can't wait to come back and read all the responses!

[willray]

4 hours ago, WisconsinMomma said:

Love this topic and can't wait to come back and read all the responses!

Don't just come back and read, tell me what works, or doesn't, with your unit!