WAGGGS Night

Tonight we celebrated World Guiding with a WAGGGS-themed evening! As the girls arrived, they worked on finishing their posters about their chosen countries and preparing to do their presentations and lead their chosen games.

We started with our usual opening and then moved right into our program.

First up, we had the Rose Patrol teach us about England and Guiding there, followed by the game "Witches Glue Pot", which is similar to Octopus.

Next, we visited Italy with the Trillium Patrol. Their game was called "Chicken Market" - and was a bit confusing, but involved lots of dramatics!

We paused for a bit in the middle of the evening and one of our Guiders gave a presentation about Our Chalet and Switzerland from her trip there in 2014.

Then it was time to travel to Mexico with the Pansy Patrol, including an active game of "Traffic Policeman".

Our final stop of the evening was the USA with the Daffodil Patrol. Here we played an interesting game called "Frog in the Sea".
The last activity of the night was a Fruit Salad-esque game created and led by our Pathfinder about the World Centres.  We ended our meeting with food - Nachos and Salsa, Cheese Pizza, and Chicken Wings. After eating and cleaning up, we closed with reminders for next week and Taps.

Happy 50th Birthday Sangam!

Sangam, the Guiding World Centre in India, will be celebrating its 50th birthday beginning in October 2016, so we decided to have our own celebration a little earlier! A big thank you to Sophie from Girlguiding Midlands who created the Sangam 2016 Challenge that we enjoyed taking part in!

At the beginning of our meeting, one of the Patrols presented their Irish Legend skit from last week to finish of our work on the Irish Legends badge. This was followed by our usual opening ceremony and an active game (Everybody's It Tag).

Our program started off with a Powerpoint presentation and discussion about Sangam and India. We learned about the World Centre, demographics and cultural information. From one Guider's collection, we were able to pass around a copy of the Indian Guide Handbook, a National Scarf, Bulbul/Guide/Ranger Enrolment Badges, and a Rashtrapati Guide Award Pin. The Guiders demonstrated wrapping and wearing a sari and a dupatta. Thanks to our Ranger Helper, the Guides were also able to watch a Bollywood dance video!

Over the course of the meeting, all of the Guides got to try wearing a sari (ours is simply a long strip of lightweight blue fabric and was quite large on most of the girls) - as we ran out of time, the Pathfinders and Rangers will get to try putting on a sari at next week's meeting.

The first activity was for the girls to make up their own Bollywood-inspired dance routines. A number of the girls had learned about Bollywood dance at school and we talked about how dance is used to tell a story and the importance of arm movements, emotions and facial expressions in Indian dances.

We paused mid-evening to play a game from India, "Cheetah, Cheetal". The cheetal is a spotted deer and the cheetah is a large cat. In this game players are divided into two teams - cheetals and cheetahs. The teams line up in the centre of the playing area with their backs to each other, facing their home bases (opposite ends of the playing area). The game leader calls out CHEEEEEE and suddenly ends with TAL or TAH. The team that has been called must race for their home while the other team tries to catch them. Anyone caught joins the other team.

The craft activity was the evening was creating Rangoli Art on square of cardstock. The Guides were shown coloured images of Rangoli designs from India and asked to create their own design. The squares will be used on a welcome sign for Advancement. As the girls finished their designs, they played another game from India called "Marigolds". Marigolds is very similar to hacky sack, except that it is played by young girls using a marigold blossom. Players start by standing on foot with the flower on the inside of raised food. They use their foot to toss the flower into the air and catch it with the same foot. The goal is to see how many times in a row you can catch the flower.

We ended the evening with food and entertainment in the form of the girl's dance routines. We had naan bread, with home-made samosas, Raita dip and almond burfi. 

Our meeting closed with reminders for cookie selling and Taps.

Activities We Chose (6)

Activity #2 Sampling Indian Dips and Poppadoms (modified to be Samosas, Naan Bread, Raita)

Activity #3 Bollywood Dance

Activity #6 Design a tile for Sangam's Pool (modified to be Rangoli Design squares)

Activity #10 Indian Sweets (Almond Burfi)

Activity #11 Traditional Indian Games ("Cheetal, Cheetah" and "Marigolds")

Activity #12 Sangam at a Glance

Guiding Around the World

The meeting before Thinking Day was devoted to Guide History and World Guiding, including working on the Learn About WAGGGS section of the Program.

As the girls arrived, each Patrol was asked to come up with ideas for ways to stay safe online (as part of the Computer Skills Badge).

We began with our usual opening ceremony, followed by an active game chosen and led by the evening's Active Living Patrol.

Our first activity was to discuss the Patrol's ideas for online safety and come up with a Unit Online Safety Code to finish off the Computer Skills Badge.

We then moved on to learning about the B-Ps and the beginnings of Guiding. One Guider (me!) gave a short potted history of the roles of Robert, Agnes and Olave Baden-Powell in the early days of Guiding. Each Patrol was then given information on one of the B-Ps and asked to make up a short presentation. We wound up with tableaux about Robert, an interview with Olave, and a skit about Agnes.

We then played a game from Africa called "Spot the Lion".  In this game, players are divided into teams and a corner of the room is assigned as their home. Everyone stands in the middle with their eyes closed and the game leader touches the back of each player. On one player, she leaves a strip of tape. When they players open their eyes, they look for the tape. When they spot it, they quietly go to their home corner. If a player thinks she is the lion, she roars loudly and everyone freezes. If she is wrong, she is 'out' and the game continues. If she is right, the team with the most players at home wins. (This was surprisingly popular and the girls have asked to play it again!)

The next activity was called Find the Country! Statements were read out with the name of a country at the end. When the country was named, one player from each Patrol had to run up and try to find the country on a world map. The first player to put her finger on the country won a point for her Patrol. Everyone was shown where the country was prior to moving to the next question. (Again, this was surprisingly popular and the girls wanted to play it a second time!)

• Our Chalet is found in ... Switzerland
• Pax Lodge is found in ... the United Kingdom
• There are 3 Girl Guide Organizations in ... Madagascar
• Guides wear a maroon and white uniform in ... Qatar
• Our Cabana is found in ... Mexico
• Sangam is found in ... India
• Guides are called Morshidat in ... Egypt
• All girl members are Guides in ... Australia
• Kusafiri has held a program in ... Ghana
• Our Twinning Partner is ... Chile
• Sparks are called Teddies in ... South Africa
• Sparks are called Pippins in ... New Zealand
• In 1958 Guiding began in ... Libya
• Lord and Lady B-P are buried in ... Kenya
• Guides wear light blue and Little Wings wear green in ... Panama
• We are going to be earning the Sustainable Energy Badge from ... Ireland
• A new member of WAGGGS in 2008 was the Guide Branch from ... Syria
• Last year we earned the St. George's Day Badge from ... Norway
• Guides promise to be responsible for their communities in ... Japan
• A Guide is welcoming and she has team spirit in ... Haiti

Our final activity was called Footprints for Kusafiri. We asked the girls to try to name the World Centres and where they are located and then talked about how Kusafiri is the 5th World Centre and how it is different from the others (traveling World Centre). We shared the logo and then asked each girl to trace her footprint and then fill it in with symbols showing her Guiding journey.

Canadian & World Guiding

The first two weeks of February were spent learning about Guiding in Canada and around the World. 

Our first meeting opened with an activity in patrols as the girls arrived. Each patrol had to create a list of all the things they use at school. We then started the meeting with our usual opening and an active game. 

As an introduction to our Going Global Service Project (and our Thinking Day Service Project), we discussed education around the world, including facts from the 2014 World Thinking Day Activity Pack. Then we went through the lists the patrols had made and narrowed the list down to the bare necessities that are collected and made into School Kits by the Mennonite Central Committee. (Each girl took home a flyer about donating these supplies - notebooks, pencils, erasers, pencil crayons and rulers.)

Next we did a participation story about the history of Guiding, followed by a relay game about the youth branches of Guiding in Canada. Each patrol had to gather and match cards to show the branch name, t-shirt, age group and enrolment pin for Sparks, Brownies, Guides, Pathfinders and Rangers.


After this, we sat down to discuss people and roles in Guiding. We learned about Lones, Pathfinders, Guiders, Link, Trefoil Guild, ACLs, and Trainers. We ended the evening with the 3rd Year Guides starting to work on a poster about Agnes, Olave and Robert Baden-Powell while the 1st and 2nd Year Guides played a Guiding Symbols Board Game.


Our second meeting started with an arrival activity where each patrol looked through magazines and found out some of the things that Guides did in the 1950s. The girls were surprised to find out that we still do many of the same things, just in different ways. We then had our usual opening and an active game (Link Tag).

We then learned about the history of Guiding in Canada, with each girl reading out one fact - we have 16 girls, so there are 16 history facts:

1910	Guiding begins! Companies are started in Toronto, St Catharines, Moose Jaw, Sardis (BC), Vancouver, Winnipeg, and Dawson (YT)
1911	The first Guide Camp is held. Guides from the 1st Toronto Company camp on the banks of the Credit River in June.
1914 to 1918	During World War I, Canadian Guides give service by working in munitions factories and government offices, volunteering in hospitals, knitting socks, and making dressings and bandages.
1924	35 Canadian Guides, Rangers and Guiders attend the first International Camp at Foxlease in England
1927	The first Girl Guide Cookies are sold. They are baked by a Guider, Christine Riepsame of Regina, and sold by the 4th Regina Guides to raise money for their activities
1928	The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts is formed with Canada as a Founding Member. Today, there are 145 member countries.
1935	Lord and Lady Baden-Powell visit Canada. While in Alberta, Lady Baden-Powell meets members of the Sarcee Nation and is given the name “Otter Woman”.
1945	The Canadian World Friendship Fund (CWFF) is set up. The Fund is used to support Guiding projects and programs around the world, including the World Centres, the World Thinking Day Fund, and projects in developing countries designed to improve the lives of girls and young women within their communities.
1953	Chocolate and Vanilla Girl Guide Cookies are first sold.
1962	The National Office at 50 Merton Street, Toronto is opened. Brownies, Guides, Rangers and Guiders ‘built’ the office by purchasing square inches for $0.10 each
1979	Pathfinders begin. The age groups are now Brownies 6 to 9, Guides 9 to 12, Pathfinders 12 to 15 and Senior Branches (Rangers, Cadets and Junior Leaders) 15 to 17+
1988	A new branch for 5-year-olds is started. They will be named Sparks in 1989.
1992	Girl Guide and Astronaut Dr. Roberta Bondar becomes the first Canadian woman in space. She takes her Brownie Wings and Girl Guide Cookies into space on board the Space Shuttle Discovery.
1993	Chocolately Mint Cookies are first sold.
2005	The new Guide Program, “Guides on the Go” is introduced. The highest award for Guides is the Lady Baden-Powell Challenge.
2010	Guiding worldwide celebrates 100 years. Since 1910, over 7 million Canadian girls and women have been at part of Guiding.

Next we played a 'find your partners' game using the World Thinking Day Focus Countries - Armenia, Bangladesh, Benin, Egypt and St Vincent & the Grenadines. Each girl had a card with either the National Flag, Guide Uniform or Guiding Logo for one of these countries. We then had the girls make groups by type (flags, uniforms, logos), something in common (i.e. colours), and finally for each country, so that we could look at and compare the flag, uniform and logo for each country. 

We then divided into groups, with the 3rd Year Guides continuing to work on their poster about Agnes, Olave and Robert Baden-Powell, while the 1st and 2nd Year Guides divided into four groups to make posters about the World Centres - Our Chalet, Pax Lodge, Our Cabana and Sangam. We also talked about the 5th World Centre Pilot Project in Africa. All of the girls will finish their posters at our February 25th meeting.

Our last activity was a game from New Zealand called Sheep Tag. In this game, one girl is 'it'. When she tags another girl, they have to lie on the ground on their bag and wave their feet in the air while saying "baaa baaa" in a pitiful sheep voice. Other players can free them by tagging their foot and saying "She'll be right Mate!" ("She'll be right Mate" is a saying that basically means everything will work out fine in the end.)

At the end of the meeting we had just enough time to sing a couple of songs and so we sang Kookaburra (which everyone knew) and Tzena (which only a few people knew).

We continued our World Guiding theme at our Chemistry Badge meetings. The girls finished up their posters at the first meeting and then presented them to the rest of the unit at the second meeting. Here are the girls' posters: