Homeschooling and Scouting: Using Scouting to Fulfill Academic Requirementsby Julie Gentry | More from this Blogger 19 Jan 2007 08:30 PM It's Friday. That means my boys have no schoolwork. What? Let me rephrase that. They have no schoolwork from their regular textbooks. Instead, Fridays at our house have become Boy Scout days. They work on their badges and advancement. Before we got involved in Scouting, I thought Boy Scouts meant camping, tying knots, and Indian folklore. Yes, those are included, but Scouting is so much more! I was amazed at the amount of scholarly requirements. Science, reading, artwork, social studies, history, civics, home arts, language, and even math are covered to some degree. We live in Washington where the homeschool regulations are minimal. Once a year, I file an affidavit stating that I'm going to homeschool, and at the end of the year a friend of ours who holds a Master Teaching Certificate evaluates the children's progress. That's it in a nutshell. I know most other states are more stringent in their restrictions and regulations. It's part of the reason we moved here. Because we'd come from California, I was used to documenting their studies. That's how I happened upon Scout School. Scout School takes all the guesswork out of it. It's laid out so you can see right away which subjects each requirement fills. For instance, today the boys are working on their Reading merit badge (bet you didn't know that one existed!). They went to the library last Friday, learned from the librarian exactly how to best search by different criteria, chose six books from four different genres including an award winner, then located them on the shelves. Sounds easy enough from an adult point of view, but if you watched last week's Beauty and the Geek, you'd be surprised. Now they're working on reading all six books. Next they'll be reading newspapers and magazine about current issues. Then it's on to the Internet to search for Scouting sites. And lastly they'll either put in four hours reading to children or helping out the librarian. All this for a little scrap of material. They're enthusiastic about it, and I don't need to nag or cajole. They'll get credit for four hours toward social studies, and forty-four hours of language arts. That's almost a quarter of what was required of government school children in our district. And it's learning that's retained. They were able to choose titles from within the parameters already set. Freedom within form. At the library, I tried to steer my reluctant reader toward the juvenile section of the biographies (one of the chosen genres). He looked at me like I was daft and came back with the 400+ page, Lee's Terrible Swift Sword. He wasn't about to have "baby books" mar his merit badge record. Peer pressure isn't always a bad thing, as long as the peers are well chosen! David's also working on his Rifle and Shotgun badges, but even they have a strong academic component to them. It's exciting to me to find something so motivating and wholesome! Does anyone else combine Scouting and Homeschooling? Learn more about Julie Gentry  Julie is affectionately known as GoGo Mama to her friends since she seems to always be out and about. Relevanthomeschooling tags User Comments Muummy (5) 20 Jan 2007 06:43 AMHi- I think we've used this for most of my son's years in scouts-- My son is finishing up the activity badges for Webelos- needs 30 requirements for Arrow of Light and all the badges to be finished... He added that he wanted to get as many of the academic and sports belt loops and pins- yet that is harder, but he has a good amount of them accomplished. Sometimes other scouting families can't understand why you've completed so many awards or badges or pins, but I have used the scout manuals to get those parts of a well rounded curriculum that you wouldn't find layed out AND totally explained in 3 pages or less. Yesterday was scout day for us also- it varies according to my work schedule. We worked on table tennis for a belt loop and then went on a field trip to a Native American Exhibit. We learned the Three sisters story of corn, squash and beans and their growing needs, the habitats of the Longhouse people, and the Decorated Regalia for their ceremonies and celebrations. We have a homeschool scout pack soon to be troop- even though others are welcome with their schedules- its a lot of work for the parents since it is organized that the families are the dens and if there is a drop in number- then our scout will be a Lone Scout until enough boys join in. We all meet together once a month for field trips as our den meetings-- its really fun- we've seen a lot of historical and educational sites all around the area. I would love to hear others ideas- and would welcome any scout to our functions!! Laurie Hendrix Pack 32. Adams, MA Jama_Mama (10) 20 Jan 2007 04:51 PMI love the idea of using scouting to fulfill academic requirements, and Scout School is a tremendous resource for seeing where different requirements might fit in academically. Here is my question to you, or anyone else who cares to jump into the discusion: Once one knows where a requirement fits, how should 'credit' be allotted (think high school transcript here). Time spent on the requirement? Just look for overlap in other work the student might be doing and check that off? What have others done? I don't think I am phrasing this well, but I hope someone can understand my question and share what they've done, as far as using Scout Requirements on transcripts.  Andrea Hermitt |
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