Wolf
I think this is one of the most fun badges to do with your cub. When the boy turns 8 or is in 2nd grade, he wants so bad to start pleasing the world and starts really taking things seriously. This is a super time to engage them in setting goals. My boys have each set the goal of having their wolf in three months. Both have accomplished that goal. After this they go after all the arrow points they can.
Most of these badges are family oriented in that you can do them as a family (or already do) and can be great Family Home Evening lessons. There is a great "teaching tool" for the young Wolf Scout. He reads the requirements, basically passes them off, and then teaches his family. It has been said that the best way to learn something is to teach it. You will see that as you learn the skill and then teach your son and in turn he will learn it as he teaches his siblings (or fellow scouts).
Achievement 1 Feats of Skills, 2 Your Flag, 3 Body Healthy, 4 Home & Community, 5 Tools, 6 Collection, 7 Living World, 8 Cooking & Eating, 9 Being Safe, 10 Family Fun, 11 Duty to God, 12 Making Choices
Arrow Point/Elective 1 Secret Codes, 2 Actor, 3 Make it Yourself, 4 Games, 5 Spare Time, 6 Books, 7 Foot Power, 8 Machine Power, 9 Party, 10 Native American, 11 Sing, 12 Artist, 13 Birds, 14 Pets, 15 Growing, 16 Family Safety, 17 Knots, 18 Outdoors, 19 Fishing, 20 Sports, 21 Computers, 22 Language
Achievement 1 "Feats of Skills"
This is a great "Family Field Day." We have done it for Family Home Evening before and then go out for ice cream. We have even gone a step further and had the boy passing it off teach his younger siblings how to do the "feats of skills." Good article on kids fitness.
Achievement 2 "Your Flag"
This is a super important achievement. Here at a young age a child will learn to respect his county, Her Flag and the state were he resides. Great history lessons await for those who want to do the research. Please click here for a list of links on the flag. You should also look at Elective 11.
Achievement 3 "Keep Your Body Healthy"
This achievement is a great health lesson. I have my son memorize the seven rules and then quiz him on them throughout the week. You can also make a handwriting page of the rules. See Achievement 9 & Elective 16.
Achievement 4 "Know Your Home and Community"
I think this is a very important lesson for the family to learn. All children should know about personal safety. This again is a great Family Home Evening lesson.
Achievement 5 "Tool for Fixing and Building"
This achievement is a great father and son project. I have had many a great wooden useful item added to my collection. One of our favorite Christmas presents is a hammer, screw driver, nails, screws and a big block of wood. The scout can practice hammering and driving a screw and be prepared to make his useful item. This goes well with Elective 3 and 7.
Achievement 6 "Start a Collection"
I'm not particularly fond of this achievement because of all the "collecting" my children do, but it does teach them to take care of things they own. If we lived closer to a major "hall of fame" we might be able to show the kids the worth of their baseball cards.
Achievement 7 "Your Living World"
For the most part our children have been doing these simple recycling practices their entire life. It just brings the fact into focus. We subscribe to quite a few nature type magazines and can always find an articles on someone or some organization trying to protect the earth. See the BSA merit badge on Environmental Science for other web links.
Achievement 8 "Cooking and Eating"
This achievement is a fun one. The scout gets to plan a few meals and learn that what you do on a daily basis isn't as easy as it looks. I suggest that you find a kid's cookbook. The recipes in there are a bit simpler and the cooking terms are explained in detail. Please see our unit on Cooking and the BSA merit badge on Cooking for other web links.
Achievement 9 "Be Safe at Home and on the Street"
Another great Family Home Evening. This is another important lesson for families to learn and practice. See Achievement 3 & Elective 16.
Achievement 10 "Family Fun"
Do two of the five requirements. This is five build in Family Home Evenings or field trips.
Achievement 11 "Duty to God"
This achievement is a good one to do in a Personal Parental Interviews or PPI. It can be done in a Family Home Evening setting, but we have found that bearing your testimony one on one with a young child can be very beneficial to both parties.
Achievement 12 "Making Choices"
This is a great achievement to do just after your young son has been baptized. We have found that we do all of nine of them listed. We do this individually in an interview and then have the boy present it to the family as a Family Home Evening on being honest, keeping the commandments and making hard choices.
Elective 1 "It's a Secret"
This is a fun elective. I participate in secret codes. I send notes in secret codes. I have them break the code and see what the message is. Sometimes it is a job for them to do but most of the time there is a treat waiting for the decoding detective. I love sign language and have several books on the language. We make it a unit study and learn more than just spelling with our hands. Personally growing up in the Northwest, I couldn't get away from Native American history. Now that I live in the Seattle area where there are many tribes, we can find much on our Lamanite Brothers and have a great time learning about their history, (see elective 10).
Elective 2 "Be an Actor"
Most of these elective can (and will) be taken care of by the den by putting on skits for pack meeting. But that doesn't need to stop you from having your scout and his siblings put on a skit for Family Home Evening, dad or the neighborhood kids. For example, I had a son write a play for a study on Greek God. He and his brothers made puppets, scenery, put together sound effects and performed the play for their dad.
Elective 3 "Make It Yourself"
This goes well with Achievement 5 and Elective 7.
Elective 4 "Play a Game"
I see the possibility of many fun Family Home Evenings here. Please note that Marbles is part of the Academics and Sports Program.
Elective 5 "Spare-Time Fun"
As the elective suggest, this is a FUN one. Flying kites is so much fun, we make a family vacation out of it. Models are fun as well. You can count your pinewood derby or other cub models you build. Visit a hobby shop and you will be overwhelmed with the amount of models you can choose from. They do not have to be wood. We have done the paper type "build a medieval port city" type to count. We have also visited the local scouting shop and found many different models. The scout shops online store is a good place to start your thinking.
Elective 6 "Books, Books, Books"
This is a natural for most any homeschooling family. I don't really need to say anymore.
Elective 7 "Foot Power"
This is an elective that you might want to do with Achievement 5 or Elective 3.
Elective 8 "Machine Power"
If there is a construction site near by that you can observe from a safe distance, this might be the time to run over and observe the different kinds of trucks that come and go. We live close to a cement/rock "factory" and we get to see many different trucks pass us while we drive around town. The wheel and axle can be done in junction with planting a garden, Elective 15.
Elective 9 "Let's Have a Party"
For a service project in conjunction with their Gospel in Action Award, my children put on a Christmas party for pre-school age children who don't go to pre-school. It has been very successful and a great learning experience. Making a gift or toy is done every Christmas and Birthday time. We have a ton of craft books that the kids go through and create something for someone they love.
Elective 10 "Native American Lore"
This is one our family's favorite. We have a collection of books and family history stories that we add while we study the history of the Native Americans (see Helaman's Academy Unit Study). We also have many museums, reservations and parks that can help us along the way. Here is a web site we like to go and explore. This is the web site for Tribes in Washington State. Here is the site for the National Museum of American Indians. This is a great web site to find your local museums etc. you will have to click on your state to find them. Here is a web site that talks about different tribes. If you can afford a trip to a museum it is worth it. This history of America is so rich and full, yet it is becoming lost and dare I say, "political corrected?"
Want to go deeper into Native American history? Here is a web page on Indian Languages. This web page can take you to Native American Legends and Stories. This web site has a list of other website dealing with the history of the Native American.
Elective 11 "Sing-Along"
If your son participate in Primary, you will have most of these electives done in no time. If he attends his pack meetings and your Cub Master loves to sing (or get handed some songs--hint, hint) 11c will be no problem either. This is a fun one to do with the family. Here is a site where you can find a ton of scout songs. You should also look to Achievement 2, for some great sites on the flag, our national anthem and its history. This will also go hand in hand with the Music Belt Loop and Pin. Here are a few sites that will help you learn about the history of America and here. Information about the National Anthem or here or here.
Elective 12 "Be an Artist"
Homeschooling is perfect for learning about art. This can go with elective 2.
Elective 13 "Birds"
This elective is one that you can complete for the Cub Scout World Conservation Award. Here are a few web pages you might find helpful. American Birding Association Birding on the Net (you can find local bird population information here) WA Birds this one has specific places that you can go to see birds. The Bird Guide is another good one. Another Washington Bird site. You can hear birds at this web site.
Here are a few books we have on our shelf to help us identify the birds in our back yard. Smithsonian Handbook Birds of North America Western Region by Fred J. Alsop III, published by DK; 2001. I think we picked it up at Costco. Wonderful book, great pictures and like most DK books have great information in small little blurbs all around the pictures. We have learned a lot from this book. But our favorite is Birds of Seattle and Puget Sound by Chris C. Fisher, published by Lone Pine Publishing in 1996. Another jam packed book on birds, but this one is specific for our neighborhood and parks that we visit. I almost want two copies, one for the house the other for the car. And of course the Audubon's guide to birds and encyclopedia.
Elective 14 "Pets"
We have allergies to animals at our house so we have to choose our pets wisely. We have chosen fish and a Yorkshire Terrier, and we added a bird. What a learning experience that was. Here are the web sites we checked out as well as the books we have. Critical Basic Care Info The Goldfish Sanctuary The Goldfish Society of America Aquariumfish.com We have learned how to test our water and learned the fine art of burying fish. Something we are studying hard to prevent in the future.
Elective 15 "Grow Something".
This elective is one that you can complete for the Cub Scout World Conservation Award. This is an elective I look forward to. I love to work in the yard and I love the way it looks when the work is all done. We have learn to test our soil and how to make it better. We have learned about the sun and its effect on our growing of tomatoes. We love to raise cut flowers and give them to our neighbors and friends. This may sound wonderful, but we live in the Pacific NorthWET and I grew up on the dry side of the mountains with a longer growing season and sun that was almost guaranteed to shine during the summer. In the Seattle area we have learned the hard way how to garden. Here is our favorite garden site. They are very specific to our region. And WSU's web site and their list of links. Here is a site that helps answers your questions. Helaman's Academy Botany unit.
Elective 16 "Family Alert"
I can not impress how important this is for these young boys to learn these skills. We hope they never have to use most of the skills learned, but if they do we want our young men prepared. This is just the beginning of first aid training for the scout. As a Boy Scout he will have many times to practice (if only pretend) these skills that he might as well learn them now and learn them well. I also want a young boy with wits as emergencies arise in my home (and they do). Of the optional ones you are required to do two
One of our family's favorite electives. This goes hand in hand with Achievement 3 & 9. Living in the Northwest we have many natural disasters that can happen to us so being prepared in our family is very important. There are a ton of web site dedicated to family preparedness. I have found that as those are all well and great they can not help you be prepared unless you do something. We have had fire drills, earthquake drills, lived through floods, and I personally lived through Mt. St. Helens' 1980 eruption. Of course living with all this has made us go beyond what this elective requires for passing it off. This is the link to our local emergency preparedness shop. Here are a few other web sites we have found helpful.
Learn CPR or How to do CPR Of course the best place to learn first aid is from your local Red Cross, so contact them or your local Boy Scout troop. Be very cautious and serious about learning this correctly and from trained personnel. Survival guidebook and checklist or this checklist The checklist is a great starting point. And of course the American Red Cross. Since we live with the danger of earthquakes, this site is helpful even if it is S. California. I like this web page because it talks so much about family preparedness. Of course doing your own web page search will give you hundreds of web sites to choose from.
A great Family Home Evening lesson and project. And of course this leads into having a years supply of essentials.
Elective 17 "Tie It Right"
A fun elective for a young boy who was just baptized and gets to wear "real neckties" at our house. Knot tying on the web, Animated knot tying page Another animated knot page. Fun With String by Joseph Leeming (Dover Publication, 1974; ISBN 0486230635)* Helaman's Academy Mini Unit
Elective 18 "Outdoor Adventure"
Another fun elective to do as a family. Toxic plants article and another article link to poison ivy, sumac and oak
Elective 19 "Fishing"
This elective is one that you can complete for the Cub Scout World Conservation Award. I have to confess, we are not fishing people. I wish my big brother lived closer so he could do the fishing stuff with my boys, but he doesn't so we either don't do this or find someone in our community or church to help us out.
Elective 20 "Sports"
Now this is an elective that is easy to complete. If your scout is on any sport team, belongs to a sport club or plays with the neighborhood kids, you can probably pass off quite a few of these requirements. They aren't hard. Our family hold a "sports day" just after public school starts. We invite many of the cub scouts and a lot of our other friends and we play those sports listed here that require a team, football, basketball, baseball for example. We also set up a badminton net and play a few matches. Our table tennis table is used as well. And while you are doing this elective you might want to look over and see what the Academics and Sports Program has to offer.
 | Rowing websites: Rowing FAQ American Canoeing Associations |
| Archery websites: National Archery Association |
| Ice Skating websites: US Figure Skating |
| Skating websites: National Inline Skating Association |
Elective 21 "Computers"
This is a very easy elective for us to complete. I hand it over to my husband who programs for a living.
Elective 22 "Say It Right"
hello in 1000 languages 1-10 in 4500 languages
Now on to Bear.
November, 2006
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