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Volunteering at Scouts is changing to help us reach more young people

Volunteering is changing to help us reach more young people

Volunteering is changing at Scouts. Read more

Discover what this means

Make your badge bucket list

Sixers lead a Pack forum where Cubs can talk about (and vote for) the badges they want to achieve.

Back to Activities

You’ll need

  • A4 paper
  • Cub Scout Badges and Awards books (or access to the internet)

Before you begin

  • Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Additional help to carry out your risk assessment, including examples can be found here. Don’t forget to make sure all young people and adults involved in the activity know how to take part safely.
  • Make sure you’ll have enough adult helpers. You may need some parents and carers to help if you’re short on helpers.

Create your badge bucket lists

  1. Give each Six a big sheet of paper, pens, and a Cub Scout Badges and Awards book (or printed badges and requirements).
  2. Sixers should lead their Six as they talk about which badges they would like to work on. If they want to, they can choose badges they’d like to do in meetings and at home, and separate their sheet of paper into ‘home’ and ‘Cub night’.
  3. Each Six should talk about the reasons they would like to do each badge, and ideas of what they could do to achieve it.
  4. Each Six should agree on their top choice badge to do at Cubs, to present to the rest of the Pack.

Present your ideas

  1. Form a panel of judges – this should include adult volunteers, young leaders, and Sixers.
  2. One by one, each Six must persuade the panel that their top choice badge is the best idea. Each Sixer should leave the panel to present with their Six.
  3. Each Six should present their top choice badge, along with the reasons they think the Pack should do it, and any ideas they have about how they could achieve it. Sixers should usually take the lead on presenting to the panel.
  4. After each presentation, each person on the panel (except the Sixer who’s presenting) should award the idea one, two, or three stars.
  5. The badge with the most stars is the winner, and should be planned into the programme as soon as possible.

Reflection

This activity was a great opportunity to be a leader. Did you make sure everyone felt important, and was heard? Were you well organised as a Six? Did anyone do anything really helpful? How did you make a plan for your presentation? Did different people have different strengths and roles in your Six?

This activity also needed you to communicate. Was it easy to tell the others which badges you were interested in? Was it easy to understand other people’s opinions? How did you talk to each other when you were making decisions? How did you communicate with the panel of judges?

Safety

All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.

There are lots of other ways for Cubs to present their top ideas, and choose their favourite. After presenting their ideas to the whole Pack, each Six should write their top choice badge (and the reasons why) on large sheets of paper, and stick them up around the meeting place. There are then three ways to vote: 

Everyone could run around until the whistle is blown, and then stand by their favourite idea. The badge with the most people stood by it is the winner.

Each Cub could be given three sticky dots, to stick on their favourite ideas. It’s up to them whether they stick all three on their favourite idea, or split them between several good ideas. The badge with the most dots is the winner.

Each Cub could be given three numbered Post-it notes (with the numbers one, two, and three). They should stick them on their favourite ideas, with the highest number (three) on their favourite badge idea. At the end, add together the numbers on all of the Post-it notes stuck to each badge idea. The badge with the highest total is the winner.

No one has to present if they don’t want to – they can still help their group prepare the presentation.

All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.

Cubs could suggest ideas and plan activities to meet the requirements of their chosen badge.

Make sure you show the Cubs that volunteers are taking their ideas seriously, and work together to make them happen.