Mill Valley Pack 34 - The official site of Mill Valley Cub Scouts Pack 34.

Webelo - Eagle - Earn that Badge!

Hi Everybody,

Great Readyman event! Thanks to Dr. Chris Ames for a very memorable presentation.

For June 1st, a week from today, it would be great if your cub could earn the Webelos Badge.

Here is the status of all the boys, as far as I know: http://bit.ly/cTBTcD

Most kids will get most of the way there if they complete the Fitness Achievement (starting on page 245 of the book), Boy Scout requirements (page 49), and Faith (page 50).

As for these and the rest of the achievements - use your imagination and have fun with you cub! As long as you tell me you've met the spirit of any given achievement, I'm good.

On Tuesday I hope to hand out a pins for Readyman and other catch-up achievements - and as many Webelos badges as possible.

Lets get there and then have a great summer. We've done a lot this year!

Best,

Dave

P.S. Here are some details on the Webelos badge requirements, FYI:

1. Read the parent guide ("How to Protect Your Children From Child Abuse"; it came with the Webelos book) with your scout.

2. Be an active member of the den for 3 months.

3. Know the meaning of the Webelos badge (page 52). I don't think there is a lot of deep symbolism... here's what the book says:

The Webelos badge is like the emblem on your Webelos cap, except that it also has the word "Webelos" and the Scout badge. The emblem is made up of a gold Scout badge with a blue "W," for Webelos, on it. It shows that you are moving from Cub Scouting to Boy Scouting.

4. Point out three special parts of Webelos Scout Uniform.

5. Earn Fitness, Citizen, and one other badge from a different activity group (e.g. Artist).

6. Plan and lead a flag ceremony.

7. Show understanding of key Boy Scout requirements.

8. Faith. See the Webelos book, page 50, for more details.

ReadyMan Achievement

Hey everybody!

We're planning on holding the ReadyMan achievement on Sunday, May 23rd at 3PM, at Ian's mom's house (Katrina Kehl).

The address is 18 Escalon Drive, Mill Valley.

The project will last about 1 hour.

The Readyman achievement is on page 365 of your Webelos book. Please try to get through the content with your cub so that we can go over the requirements quickly and get to the main event...

...a seminar in brain surgery, by Pearson's dad, Dr. Christopher Ames of the UCSF Department of Neurological Surgery!!

First aid and field dressing is important, but you never know when you might need to perform a quick tune-up on someone's brain!

Dr. Ames will come armed with a few videos of brain surgery that will definitely be educational...

OK, not that movie.

Katrina will have popcorn and lemonade for the boys.

Hope you can make it!

Best,

Dave

Webelo - Eagle - End of Year Events

Wow, this year has gone by fast!

We have only two more meetings as a pack - tomorrow night (Wednesday 5/12) and the Bridging Pool Party, June1.

Tomorrow we'll hand out achievement pins for the Outdoorsman Activity. Here's my list of cubs who have met the requirements: http://bit.ly/bSld5g - click on the "Mar 10" tab.

For June 1st, we should focus on getting all the boys to earn the Webelos Badge. Here's what needs to be done:

1. Read the parent guide ("How to Protect Your Children From Child Abuse"; it came with the Webelos book) with your scout.

2. Be an active member of the den for 3 months. (Everybody has earned this.)

3. Know the meaning of the Webelos badge (page 52). I don't think there is a lot of deep symbolism... here's what the book says:

The Webelos badge is like the emblem on your Webelos cap, except that it also has the word "Webelos" and the Scout badge. The emblem is made up of a gold Scout badge with a blue "W," for Webelos, on it. It shows that you are moving from Cub Scouting to Boy Scouting.

4. Point out three special parts of Webelos Scout Uniform. (I marked the boys down who passed uniform inspection.)

5. Earn Fitness, Citizen, and one other badge from a different activity group (e.g. Artist). Note: do the Fitness Achievement with your family.

6. Plan and lead a flag ceremony. (Our den did this on September 9. If your cub participated in a 9/11 flag raising ceremony, I'd count that as well.)

7. Show understanding of key Boy Scout requirements.

8. Faith. See the Webelos book, page 50, for more details.

Future Den Meetings & Achievements

Date TBD, visit to Tier 1 Data Center in South San Francisco (one of Facebook's data centers) - Communicator + Traveler Achievements (p. 165, 461) - Dave LaDuke to organize - sorry this has taken so long

Date TBD, Readyman Achievement (p. 365) - organized by Dr. Chris Ames - he is a brain surgeon, so this one should be very interesting!

See you tomorrow!

Best,

Dave

Outdoorsman - Tamarancho this weekend

Hi everybody,

Looks like we're going to have a nice campout up at Tamarancho this weekend.

If you can't make it, there will be a couple of more campouts they can attend next year.

Here's what I'm suggesting we do to combine it with the Outdoorsman Achievement.

Do two of these:

1. Plan and take part in an evening outdoor activity that includes a campfire. We'll do that Saturday evening. Kids can tell help build campfire, tell stories, etc.

2. Take part in a overnight campout. Sleep in a tent that you have helped pitch. Get your kid to help you pitch your tent.

And do five of these:

1. Discuss how to follow the Leave No Trace Front-country Guidelines. I'll go over these before campfire on Saturday night.

2. Discuss rules of outdoor fire safety. Same.

3. Assist in prep, cooking and cleanup for one of the meals. The kids should check in with Bruce or Doug about which meal they can help this.

4. Visit a nearby Boy Scout Camp. Everyone who goes, gets this one.

5. Three-mile hike. Given kids will be doing the range on Sunday, lets do this another time. Maybe combine with Naturalist outing?

Let me know if you have any other ideas or questions.

Thanks,

Dave

Webelo - Eagle - Upcoming Events

Hi everyone...

A long-overdue update from den leader Dave! Densely packed with info about upcoming events! Here we go...

Earning the Webelos Badge

 

It would be great for us to bridge our boys to Webelos at the April Pack Meeting (checking on date).

I've put up a spreadsheet showing what I know about the cubs' progress, here: http://bit.ly/bSld5g

Email me if there is new info and I'll update the spreadsheet. Here's a summary of the Webelos requirements:

1. Read the parent guide ("How to Protect Your Children From Child Abuse"; it came with the Webelos book) with your scout.

2. Be an active member of the den for 3 months. (Everybody has earned this.)

3. Know the meaning of the Webelos badge (page 52). I don't think there is a lot of deep symbolism... here's what the book says:

The Webelos badge is like the emblem on your Webelos cap, except that it also has the word "Webelos" and the Scout badge. The emblem is made up of a gold Scout badge with a blue "W," for Webelos, on it. It shows that you are moving from Cub Scouting to Boy Scouting.

4. Point out three special parts of Webelos Scout Uniform. (I marked the boys down who passed uniform inspection.)

5. Earn Fitness, Citizen, and one other badge from a different activity group (e.g. Artist). Note: do the Fitness Achievement with your family.

6. Plan and lead a flag ceremony. (Our den did this on September 9. If your cub participated in a 9/11 flag raising ceremony, I'd count that as well.)

7. Show understanding of key Boy Scout requirements.

8. Faith. See the Webelos book, page 50, for more details.

Future Den Meetings & Achievements

March 27, Tamarancho Spring Campout - we will tackle the Outdoorsman Achievement (p. 343) - Dave LaDuke to run at the campout

Before April 14, do the Fitness Achievement (p. 245) with your family

April, date TBD, visit to Tier 1 Data Center in South San Francisco (one of Facebook's data centers) - Communicator + Traveler Achievements (p. 165, 461) - Dave LaDuke to organize - shooting for a Wednesday afternoon when kids have early dismissal

Date TBD, Readyman Achievement (p. 365) - organized by Pearson's dad, Dr. Chris Ames - he is a brain surgeon, so this one should be very interesting!

Saturday May 8, 10AM -12 PM - Naturalist Achievement (p. 317) - organized by Nico's mom, Juliet Mohit - it will be in the Marin Headlands. Emily, a nature guide, will lead a hike.

Also...

Susie Ames is organizing a SECRET collaborative painting as a goodbye present to our Den Leader, Bruce Berlinger. She'll organize a time when kids can stop by ArtStart to contribute to the masterpiece. Stay tuned.

Thats about it... Hope to see you up at Tamarancho next weekend!

Best,

Dave

Pack 34 Webelos Trip to Point Bonita - Geology Achievement

Pack 34 at Point Bonita

Max, Jonny, Bing-Bing

 



Kids who climb on rocks

 



Point Bonita

 



Oreo tectonics

 



Waiting to eat the Oreos (erosion demonstration)

 



Bridge to lighthouse

 



Lighthouse gargoyles

 

Pack 34 - Webelos - Geologist Achievement

Hello Webelo-Eagle Patrol Families

Hopefully the boys are ready to learn about some cool local rocks and fault zones this month...we have arranged for a group activity to satisfy some of the requirements for the Webelos Geologist Achievement.  This event is scheduled for next Sunday, January 31st at 10a.m..  We will be meeting up at the Marin Headlands Visitor Center at Point Bonita where an educational intern from the National Park Service has generously agreed to take the group on a geology hike out to the lighthouse.  The hike to Point Bonita is about a half mile down to the lighthouse and then another half a mile back up.  The guides usually spend about 2 hours with the students on this hike.  They will learn to identify the different types of Franciscan rocks and see geologic change along the trail. If there is time we can also head to Rodeo Beach to learn about the rainbow rocks there. 

Some details:
  • Please let me know if you will be attending so that I can advise our guide how many to expect. Thank you.
  • Please arrive a few minutes early so that we can get started at 10 a.m. (The center opens for public tours at noon, and the guides need to be back and ready for that).
  • Cub scouts should be in uniform.
  • This is a rain or shine hike, so please dress for the weather (note: if there are extreme winds we cannot cross the bridge to the lighthouse, but will study rocks on this side of the bridge).
  • Please review the chapter in the Webelos handbook on Geology (p.279-298) before the hike & have your scout complete the attached "Geology" activity sheet to hand in to Dave LaDuke  to satisfy the geology achievement.
  • Let's consider starting the "Leave No Trace Awareness" (p.73) program on this hike. Three separate outing are required to work toward this goal.
  • There may also be an opportunity to work Geo-caching into this outing. There are two cache sites in the immediate area that look interesting. If there are any experienced Geo-cachers out there with 2 or more GPS devices, your help would be very welcome. Thank you.

This promises to be a fun and interesting activity, so hopefully it works with everyone's very busy schedules.  Please let me know if you have any questions or need additional info.

 

Best regards,

Tarji Rodriguez

Location

The Marin Headlands Visitor Center is located in the historic Fort Barry Chapel, at the intersection of Field and Bunker Roads. The Visitor Center is approximately 3 miles from either entrance to the Marin Headlands.

Phone
(415) 331-1540

Driving Directions-To MAHE VC from the North Bay

Follow 101 south through the Waldo tunnel. Take the last “Sausalito” just before the Golden Gate bridge. Turn right at the end of the exit ramp. Pass under 101, at the stop sign go straight onto Alexander Avenue. Turn left on Bunker Road (a brown sign saying “Marin Headlands Visitor Center” marks the intersection). Go through the one-way tunnel and drive approximately 2 miles. Turn left onto Field Road. The visitor center will be on the right side of the road.

 


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Pack 34 Webelo "Citizen" Activity Badge

Greetings Pack 34 Webelos & Parents of Webelos,

 This month we will be working on our "Citizen" Activity Badge.

 Since most of this work can be done at home, I have attached a work sheet that you can print and use for this.

Completed work sheets can be turned in at our general Pack Meeting in December. Note that the Webelo Handbook (starting on page #144) is a great resource of general information needed to answer the bulk of these questions. Other resources can be found online per the examples on the last page of the work sheet.

 To fulfill item #10, we are working on scheduling a Den field trip that will take place near the end of this month. This may involve a tour of Mill Valley City Hall along with meeting and talking with a community leader, or, another option might be a tour of the Marin Civic Center with a visit to a “live” court room trial!

We will give you an update as these ideas develop.

Also, there is another opportunity to help you earn your “Citizen” badge by participating in our annual "Scouting for Food" activity. This takes place November 14th and November 21st  (Per Doug Gelbach’s recent e-mail).

On November 22nd, we will be working on our 2nd round of “Athlete” activities with Bruce Cardinal & Rob Luster. We plan to "piggy back" a 1/2 hour Webelo gathering onto this already planned meeting to go over some additional “Citizen” items. So, please plan on staying around for an additional 30- Minutes.

Other Notes:

Notice that reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, and knowing its meaning is one of our requirements. I have included a link to an old "Red Skelton” video clip that you might find amusing and informative. Please watch this short video with your Webelo if you feel that it’s appropriate.

Learning about the American Flag and proper etiquette is also part of our “Citizen” requirement. It looks like we will have an opportunity to learn some of this at the pack meeting tomorrow (November 11th).

Please let me know if you have any questions or input regarding this message. Remember….“Do Your Best”.

We look forward to seeing you soon!

Best Regards,

Peter E. Gilmore (Edward's Dad)

 

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Webelos-Eagle Patrol

Hi Webelos Parents,

There are a lot of Scout activities approaching fast and we are looking for some help to make them all happen…business first. The website is a very good source of current information.

www.Mvpack34.org

Dave has set up a google calendar (I think he’s still working on it but up until recently the google calendar was automatically syncing to my iphone! Which is awesome!! Thanks Dave. When it’s complete he will send out instructions on how to make it work).

We have 17 Webelos in the Eagle Patrol. That’s about 10 more than a Den should have-but Dave is confident that we can manage it and the more hands we have the more we can get done. We’ve also been assigned the privilege of managing Winter Camp this year. Our group will have priority over everyone else and it looks like there might not even be enough bunks for all of us to go. We are responsible for supplying and preparing the food and we would like to create a hat (knit hat is currently in the works). Susie Ames has volunteered to work with me on the menu and budget. If anyone else is an expert in this area and can offer help or is willing to do the Costco run – please let me know. In addition, if anyone has any good resources for purchasing approx 45 knit hats either embroidered or a sew on patch please let me know. Scott Shern already has the artwork he’s just working on the application. If we order a patch we would need to find someone with a sewing machine willing to sew them on! Anyone? If you have any ideas for activities (movie at night or activity we can set up for the boys in case there’s no snow) please speak up!

Please respond to this email to confirm that we’ve got the right email address and to let me know if you would like to attend Marin Sierra Winter Camp. As soon as we reach our place in the pecking the order I will let you know how many spots are open. Pecking order within our group will be based on volunteers!! For the new scouts, up until this year we have not had any events where we had to limit the number of participants. We’ve always been able to accommodate all that want to participate. For some reason, Pack 34 is huge this year and we’re looking at ways of fixing this. We’ll probably start organizing events by Den (not Pack) so the groups are manageable.

Enjoy the mid-week day off and hope to see you all at the Pack Meeting tomorrow night.

Lisa Gilmore

Webelos Athlete Achievement and Presidential Fitness Testing

Webelos Scouts,

Rob Luster and I will lead the activities for the Webelos Athlete Achievement and Fall 2009 Presidential Physical Fitness Testing.   We have selected activities that can all be done at the Tam High football field and running track.

The Athlete Activity requires that the boys perform certain tests and then take the tests again at least 30 days later to measure progress.   So, we have scheduled two dates for this activity.  This will also allow the boys to perform the Presidential Fitness Tests and then try to improve their scores again when we meet the second time.

The dates will be Sat. Oct. 17 and Sun. Nov. 22.  We will meet at the Tam High Track at 9:00 am on both of those days.  We will start with some warm-up stretching and then commence testing.  The events will be as follows:

·        Warm Up Stretching

·        Curl Ups (Presidential and Webelos Athlete)

·        Push Ups (Presidential and Webelos Athlete)

·        Pull Ups* (Presidential and Webelos Athlete)

·        Standing Long Jump (Webelos Athlete)

·        Vertical Jump (Webelos Athlete)

·        50 Yard Dash (Webelos Athlete)

·        Shuttle Run (Presidential)

·        V-Sit Reach (Presidential)

·        One-Half Mile or Mile Run** (Presidential)

·        Quarter Mile Run*** (Webelos Athlete)

*For purposes of determining the Presidential Fitness award level, the better of the push up or pull up score will be used.

**Boys that are 8 or 9 can choose either the half mile or mile run.  Boys 10 and over must run the mile run.

***Boys that run the one-half or mile run for Presidential need not run the quarter mile run as well.  The longer run will count toward Webelos Athlete.

The Presidential Fitness qualifying standards for each event are included in the attached spreadsheet.  The Presidential Physical Fitness Award is achieved by attaining the 85th percentile in all five events.  The National Physical Fitness Award is achieved by attaining the 50th percentile in all five events.

The proper technique for each of the Presidential Fitness tests is explained here:  http://www.presidentschallenge.org/educators/program_details/physical_fitness/events.aspx

When practicing any of the events, please make sure your scout uses the proper technique.

Lastly, Rob Luster leads a 30 minute workout at the Tam High track every Mon, Wed, and Fri morning at 7:00 AM.  These workouts are designed to build strength, speed, and flexibility.  The workouts were originally started a couple of years ago to aid our kids with their sports but they have now become a staple for parents as well.  Please feel free to join us and bring your scout to any of the workouts.  The workouts will help prepare them for the above fitness tests.  During the month of October Rob and I will focus the workouts on preparing the boys for the Presidential Fitness and Webelos Athlete testing.

We look forward to seeing you on Oct. 17th.

Bruce Cardinal

Rob Luster

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