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Make a memory jar

It’s time to look back on the past year. Remember experiences, consider changes, and share your favourite moments.

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You’ll need

  • Pens or pencils
  • Scrap paper

Before you begin

  • Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. There's also more guidance to help you carry out your risk assessment, including examples.
  • 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. 

Planning and setting up this activity

  • This activity is a great chance to reflect. You might want to do it at the end of the year, when people move Sections, at camp or at the end of a term.
  • You don’t need to do this activity to earn a Joining In Award (though we think they go together nicely). You get a Joining In Award for each year you’re part of Scouts.

Make a memory jar

  1. Everyone should take a jar. Plastic jars work best. 
  2. Let everyone decorate their jar to remind them of their favourite things or to remind them of Scouts. They may just want to be creative. You could use paints, permanent markers, stickers, self-adhesive felt or anything else. You could also wrap or stick some paper to the jar and draw on that in felt tips.
  3. When everyone’s finished decorating the jar, ask everyone to think about their time in Scouts (or the last term or year!)
  4. People should cut up lots of pieces of paper and write down the favourite things they’ve done on each one. It could be a time they’re proud of, a skill they’ve learned, something funny that made them laugh, an activity, getting a badge or a time someone helped them.
  5. They can continue to add to it as they do more exciting things.
  6. At the end, each person (or anyone who wants to) could choose one memory to share. People should only share something they’ve written if they’re happy and comfortable to.
  7. You could also ask people to write down their happy memories of someone else and what they did, then give them to each other to add to the jars.

Reflection

This activity was all about building friendships by reflecting on the past year together. Was it difficult to choose just one memory to share? Was it easy for people to see how they’ve grown and learned things, or did they have to think hard? Change often happens slowly and gradually so it’s not too obvious at the time – it’s only when people look back that they can see how they’ve grown. Does sharing memories help make friendships stronger? 

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.

You must run your activities in line with the Safeguarding Code of Conduct for Adults (Yellow Card) and report any concerns to the UK HQ Safeguarding Team.

Spelling isn’t important here. If anyone struggles, they could ask a friend in another group (or an adult) for help with the writing.

All Scout activities should be inclusive and accessible.

Joining In Award