L

Just so you know, bodies of water in the Lake District don’t have ‘Lake’ in their name (except Bassenthwaite Lake).

Lakes in general are lowercase, but specific lakes need a capital L, for example, Lake Baikal, Lake Eerie.

The Land Registry is the government department that registers the ownership of land and properly in England and Wales. The Scottish equivalent is the Registers of Scotland, and Land and Property Services maintain records for Northern Ireland.

An event that usually happens on the second Saturday in September. The Proms is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts (and other events), mostly in the Royal Albert Hall in London.

The bugle or trumpet call, played during Remembrance (and other occasions). 

Often, you don’t need to use the word if the sentence gives enough context. For example, ‘we’re meeting this week’ is fine, you don’t need to say ‘we’re meeting later this week’.

Generally, it’s best to avoid use Latin phrases such as ‘ad nauseam’. They’re not the easiest to understand, and you’ll be far closer to our tone of voice if you say ‘talked about until everyone was fed up’ instead. If you have to use Latin, keep it in normal text.

It’s written like ‘26 deg 11 min N’.

All one word.

Comes from the same root as devastate, so use it in the same way. Basically, a hurricane would ‘lay waste a village’ not ‘lay waste to a village’ or ‘lay a village to waste’.

Lead Volunteers provide leadership and inspiration to other volunteers and manage Leadership Teams. You may notice different Lead Volunteer titles. This is because Lead Volunteers exist at Group, District and County/Area/Region level.

Previous role name: Commissioner. This is one of our significant changes to volunteer's titles to make the language clearer and more accessible.

Use ‘volunteer’ (rather than ‘leader’ or ‘helper’) whenever you can, except in activities where you may need to talk about what a leader should or could do.

If you’re talking about a specific role title (for example, Beaver Scout Leader), capitalise it.

While many places have had their own form of leadership teams before, we're now bringing this into our new teams structure. They'll be made up of Lead Volunteers, Team Leaders and Leadership Team Members. They exist at Group, District and County/Area/Region levels, but their overall purpose is to inspire and motivate volunteers across their teams, however that may look locally.

Volunteers who are members of a Leadership Team, although aren't a Team Leader. They'll support the Leadership Team, and some may have specific allocated tasks.

Please note, some Deputy Commissioners may become Leadership Team Members as their role goes, but don't assume and always double check.

Please capitalise our Learning, it's not a verb in this case, but the new name for the content that teaches volunteers about the skills and qualities they'll need so their volunteering goes smoothly.

Previously known as Training, we've changed this to reflect our aim of supporting volunteers, rather than compliance.

This is an accreditation which allows volunteers to approve completed learning for other volunteers, and record learning on scouts.org.uk for those who need an alternative to e-learning. It may change over the next few years, as we move from the Adult Training Scheme to The Learning Tree.

Now an accreditation, this used to be the Training Adviser role.

Picture a large oak tree with branches and roots and you've got our new learning framework, replacing the Adult Training Scheme. The Learning Tree consists of Growing Roots and Branching Out Learning.

It's currently blossoming and growing, and will have replaced the Adult Training Scheme modules by the end of 2025.

Choose ‘learned’ rather than ‘learnt’. See past participles for the lowdown.

The past tense of the verb ‘to lead’.

The lower case lent is the past tense of lend.

In Christianity, Lent is the period before Easter devoted to remembering Jesus fasting in the wilderness and other events leading up to and including his death. Christians reflect and ask for forgiveness; many people choose to give something up or start something new, for example, giving up meat or starting to do more chores. In western Christian churches, Lent begins on Ash Wednesday and ends on Holy Saturday.

We know, it’s a complicated one.

Less means ‘not as much’; we use it for things that can’t be counted. Fewer means ‘not as many’; we use it for things that can be counted.

For example, you might have fewer campfires, cookies, or arguments. You might have less fuel, milk, or anger.

Sometimes it makes a real difference: ‘less bad things’ means things that aren’t as bad, while ‘fewer bad things’ means a smaller number of bad things.

Let down is a verb meaning descending before making a landing or causing someone to feel disappointed; let up is a verb meaning something undesirable becoming less intense.

Letdown is a noun meaning a feeling of disappointment or a decrease in size, volume, or force; letup is a noun meaning a pause in the intensity of something difficult, dangerous, or tiring.

A cancer of the white blood cells. There are different types of leukaemia; it depends on the type of white blood cell it affects and how fast it grows. Remember, don’t use words like ‘battle’ or ‘fighting’ to talk about someone’s experience of cancer. See battle for more info.

LGBTQ+ stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning. People often mean it to include more identities, including pansexual, agender, gender fluid, asexual, and many more – the plus sign at the end indicates the groups who don’t have their own letter.

Most descriptors (including homosexual, gay, bisexual, queer, asexual, and pansexual) are adjectives. You’d say ‘a queer person’, ‘a bisexual man’, or ‘pansexual people’; never ‘homosexuals’. Lesbian is the exception, as it began as a noun and was only used as an adjective (for example, to describe a relationship) later.

‘Straight’ isn’t the opposite of LGBTQ+. For example, someone may be transgender and heterosexual.

Write it out in full, at least the first time you use it.

Licence is the noun, license the verb. You need to have a driving licence to drive a car, but a Scout might be licensed to fly a plane.

This is another tricky one. If you’re talking about to lie as in to say something untrue, the past tense is lied. If you mean to lie down, the past tense is lay. If you mean to lay a table (or an egg, or to put something down) the past tense is laid.

One word, not two.

Don’t get lifejackets and buoyancy aids mixed up. Lifejackets are for emergency situations; they’ll keep you afloat even if you’re not swimming or treading water and they’ll hold your face out of the water even if you’re unconscious.

Buoyancy aids help give you buoyancy, but you may still need to swim or tread water to stay properly afloat. In sports, buoyancy aids are often used because they’re less bulky and allow a greater range of movement.

One word.

We don’t mind which you use, as long as they’re one word and you’re consistent. 

One word, please.

Avoid using ‘like’ as a connecting word before a verb – if ‘as if’ could work in your sentence, it’s probably best to use it. For example, ‘ride as if you’re riding a bike’ or ‘it looks as if it’s snowing’.

Be careful whether you actually mean to say ‘such as’. ‘Like’ excludes while ‘such as’ includes. ‘Writers like Aarav’ means that writers who share Aarav’s characteristics, but not Aarav himself. ‘Writers such as’ Aarav includes Aarav as well as others like him.

Don’t just automatically use ‘such as’ though – ‘I’m not a big adventurer like Bear Grylls’ is correct, and replacing it with ‘such as’ wouldn’t make sense.

Bullet points are best, unless you’re writing instructions (or an activity) or need a list within a list. Head to bullet points to remind yourself of the grammar rules, then you’ll probably need a refresher on the lovely Oxford comma before you get stuck in.

If you’re formatting numbered lists: 

1.
   a)
   b)
   c)
2.
   a)
   b)
      (i) Try to avoid going down to the third level of lists, please.
      (ii)
3.

Use these please – we’re in metric. Stick to ‘litres’ in full.

A ‘local’ is a pub, not a person. You speak to a local person, not a local (unless you’ve had too much fun in the local beforehand). 

Capitalise it, but only if you’re talking about a Beaver Scout Lodge (a smaller group of Beaver Scouts within a Colony who look out for one another, and help each other grow).

Beaver Lodges are usually headed up by a Beaver Scout taking on a peer leadership role. They can be called Lodge Leaders, Junior Leaders, or something else entirely – and everyone takes it in turns to take on the challenge. Being a peer leader is about being a superhero for a little while – doing things like welcoming new people to the Colony, being extra helpful during a camp, or taking charge of a game or activity. 

It might sound obvious, but if you live or work near London, don’t assume that everyone else will be on the same page. Readers may not know where things are (for example, remind people that King’s Cross is in north London) and remember that there’s a Victoria station in Manchester as well as London.

Longitude is written as ‘114 deg 11 min W’.

One word if you’re using it as an adjective (especially to describe a person), for example, ‘a longtime browser of style guides’.

The opposite of tight, not firmly fixed, not tied up or shut in, or not fitting closely. A knot could be loose, as could a t-shirt, or a pony. Don’t get it confused with lose.

Call it the ‘House of Lords’ the first time, then ‘the house’ after that.

The cricket ground in London.

The opposite of win, no longer having something, or not being able to find something. A football team could lose a match, and a person could lose their keys, their pony, or some weight. Don’t get it confused with loose.

Not loveable, please.