CM 3 Audioblog #26 An Introduction to Scouting

CM 3 Audioblog #26 An Introduction to Scouting

Show Notes:

Brittney McGann left her career as a high end hairstylist to homeschool her children in 2011. Since then she has researched and written on Charlotte Mason education, hosted and presented at retreats and leads two Charlotte Mason focused homeschool groups, including a family scouting group. Brittney wrote introductions to and facilitated the republication of sloyd books Paper Modelling, by M. Swannell and Cardboard Modelling, by William Heaton. She and her husband are working to restore native trees and wildflowers to their 3.5 acres in North Carolina. Along with their three children Brittney and her husband currently share their home with two guinea pigs, two rabbits, three guinea fowl and a few dozen luna moth cocoons.

Show Transcript:

CM EP 26



Julie -

Welcome to the Charlotte Mason Show, a podcast dedicated to discussing Ms. Mason's philosophy, principles, and methods. It is our hope that each episode will leave you inspired and offer practical wisdom on how to provide this rich living education in your modern home school. So, pull up a chair, we're glad you're here.

Today's episode of the Charlotte Mason Show was brought to you by Medi-Share. Find out more about this affordable Christian alternative to traditional health insurance at medishare.com.

A Charlotte Mason Show would also like to thank their sponsor, Operation Christmas Child. Now, more than ever, children need hope. As the world struggles with the coronavirus pandemic, we want to let them know that God loves them, and has not forgotten them. The best way to get involved is to pack a shoebox yourself. As you specially select each item, packing a Shoebox becomes a blessing for you as well as the child who receives it. Be sure to include a personalized note and photo. If packing our traditional shoebox isn't an option for you this year, we can do it for you. Build a shoebox online. You can find out more at samaritanspurse.org/occ. Again, that's samaritanspurse.org/occ.

Today I have a very special announcement. A Gentle Feast has come out with a new book, it's called Scouting for Wild Ones. It's a comprehensive scouting curriculum. Brittany McGann is the author, and I am super excited to be able to give this to the homeschooling community, but also just the community at large. If you know people who are real outdoorsy and wanna teach their kids some outdoor skills, it doesn't matter what kind of schooling they do. This can be something that can be done in the evening or on weekends. But it's basically scripted lessons that teach your family, or group of children, if you want to do it that way, basic scouting skills, like how to use a compass, how to read a map, how to track animals. And Charlotte Mason included scouting in her curriculum. She saw the value of these skills, and it really does incorporate so many different subjects.



So, Brittany McGann, the author of this book, is going to be reading to you today about scouting and just the different subjects it brings, and the importance of including this in their child's life-long education. And I also want to make sure that I don't forget to let you know that this book has presale pricing through December 10th, 2020. So if you are listening to this episode after that date, you will miss the presale. But if you were listening before December 10th, 2020, the book is on pre-sale prices. If you want to check it out, go to agentlefeast.com/product, then scouting book. All one word. I'll also link to this blog post if you'd like to read it, and I will link to the product in the show notes as well. So again, that's agentlefeast.com/product/scoutingbook.

Alright, let's jump in and hear from Brittany.

Brittany -

Scouting for Wild Ones, by Britney McGann.


For the past few days, I've been ruminating on the subject of scouting, thinking of how best to share something I have grown to love so much over the past couple of years. Some things that immediately come to mind - camping, tracking, nature knowledge - are all part of the practice of scouting, but they don't encompass what scouting means.

Like all subjects included in a Charlotte Mason education, scouting is about more than acquiring skills. Much like the subject of Sloyd, scouting has his own philosophy that dovetails beautifully with Mason's philosophy of Education. Scouting is about character. A scout at his best is duty-bound, honorable, loyal, reverent, brave, and selfless. He learns to be resourceful, cheerful observant, discerning, helpful, and careful.

After two years of teaching scouting to 2 different groups of children, I have come to think of scouting in this way. Scouting teaches children how to read the story of Creation and then how to become a full participant in that story. My journey with Charlotte Mason began when my oldest daughter was about three and a half, and by the time she was 5, still too early for full lessons, I was already digging around in the Charlotte Mason archives, trying to understand the enormity of this way of educating children.

I remember reading Sir Baden Powell's contribution to In Memoriam, which describes a young boy ambushing his Brigadier General father from a tree alongside his Mason educated governess. I immediately went searching for Baden Powell's scouting book and put it in my someday wish list. Then three years ago, we moved an hour away from all our friends to a small piece of land between a pasture and forest. With no prospects for neighborhood friends, my oldest daughter, nine at the time, was seriously in need of community. So I decided to start a new one, and the thread to bind us together would be scouting.

Though I had already been studying nature for nearly a decade and though I had grown up camping and enjoying the outdoors, I really had no clue how to teach scouting. But I recognized that scouting, like every other subject I taught as a homeschool teacher, was something I would learn as we went along. I read Sir Baden Powell's book, Scouting for Boys. I found some old survival books and added tracking books to my field guide collection. There were so many things that were completely new to me. I had never used a compass before. I had no idea that there was a difference between True North and magnetic North. I didn't know that tracking involved more than footprints.

I wouldn't have ever thought to turn around on a hike to observe the trail so I would recognize it on the way back. Nor had I ever considered how the shadows later in the day could be confusing on the trail.

Scouting covers so many things and overlaps with so many subjects. Geography, nature study, art, handicrafts, physical education, math, citizenship. I realized that I needed a plan to systematically work through the subjects so that the skills would build upon each other and the children, and parents too, would gradually grow in knowledge and confidence. What resulted were scripted lesson plans that I am so excited to be able to share through the publishing of A Gentle Feast.

Observation

The beginning of scouting is observation. We have five senses that we greatly underuse. Like our muscles, our senses need exercise to develop and serve us well. Before we can understand what is going on in the world around us and react to it, we need to notice what is happening in the first place? While all five senses should be intentionally cultivated, these 3 are the ones we can safely use for investigation and exploration.

Sight

Though we look, we don't always see the things before us. Mothers, please indulge me in a little exercise. Walk out of the room your family is in. Now that you are alone in a room, try to remember what each person in your household is wearing. Can you do it? You probably remember the people you dressed, or the one in the striped leg warmers, tutu, and leopard cardigan. Or was that just my daughter? But how about the others? Or how about your husband?

When I do this exercise with children, few can remember what their mothers are wearing. They look at their mothers all day, but they don't see them. In scouting, we're looking to train the sight along the lines of Sherlock Holmes, or, if you're also a psych fan, Shawn Spencer. Through games and challenges, the children gradually learned to notice and remember the things around them. The more they notice, the more curious they become.

I've been raising caterpillars for about eight years. I know their habits, their food, and even their excrement, also known as poop. All summer long, I can't help but find caterpillars everywhere. The things that were invisible have become glaringly obvious.



Smell

We also take our noses for granted. We know that they can lead us to freshly baked cookies or alert us to the consequences of forgetting to set the timer for said cookies, but they are capable of so much more. Our noses can distinguish between Rosemary and sage, between cardamom and clove. We can use our noses to find black trumpet mushrooms, hidden in the moss under a hickory tree, or take shelter before a storm because we notice the sweet, fresh smell of ozone in the air.

Our sense of smell can alert us to dangers or increase our pleasure at new experiences. The thing that is often lacking is simply the thought to take notice. My favorite exercise for scent is a blind smell test. I take about a dozen covered jars filled with distinctly smelling items and ask the children to write down what they think they smell. Some things smell familiar, but they can't think of what it's called.

Realization of what they don't know encourages the children to put names to smells and follow their noses to investigate new scents.



Hearing

Have you ever said a word so many times that it loses meaning? The phenomenon is called semantic satiation. It's probably not scientifically true, but I think it's a good way to explain how we often perceive the sounds all around us. Meaningless and repetitive noise. But every mother knows that it's necessary to maintain her ability to discern the meaning of sounds for her home to run smoothly.

Five-year-old's footsteps running across the hall upstairs. Bump and thud, ten seconds of silence, then more running. She fell, got up, and is fine. No need to stop math lessons. Two-year-old was playing with cars in the next room but is gone completely silent. Better go make sure he isn't using your mascara to draw on the walls.

If we only had the same care for the sounds of nature, we would find that the squirrel, a very grumpy fellow, is warning the other creatures that are strangers in the woods. We would hear the tiny voices of a nearby nest of Carolina wrens calling for their dinner from a mossy heap or the sound of a Wolf spider purring to attract his mates. There is a reason for every sound for every leaf that rustles and every cricket that chirps, there is a chapter in the story.

Reading the story

Learning to use our senses was like learning the alphabet. Once we had eyes to see, ears to hear, and noses at the ready, we could begin to read the story our observations were telling. As I mentioned before when I started to learn scouting, I thought that tracking was simply looking for animal paw prints in the soil. I now know, as do my scouts, that animals leave sign. They leave evidence of their presence beyond pawprints.

We keep our eyes open for animal trails, broken twigs, gnawed leaves, discarded food, and scat. We listen for the sounds of movement on the forest floor or in the trees, and our ears are attuned to the distinct calls of local birds. Our noses might take us to the remains of a mole that came out of his hole and never made it back in. When we are lucky enough to come across actual tracks, we can see that two deer, a fawn, and her mother walked Southwest at a leisurely pace, eating hearts of busting as they went. But later another deer ran North across the same space and slipped in the mud as he ran.

We use these same skills of observation to learn about the stars, the weather, to find our way on the trail, and choose the best place to make camp. Careful observation can also tell us a lot about people. What they do, where they have been, how they're feeling, and sometimes, that they need help. Like a book sitting on his shelf, these things are always there, but it is up to us to open the book and immerse ourselves in the story.

Participating in the story

While many of the subjects taught in scouting begin with observation, they also require action and skill. Only a couple of weeks ago, my middle daughter, 9 years old, announced that she saw a doe with her late-season fawn grazing in the yard. Before I had time to react, she had slipped out the door, still in pajamas, and was walking silently toward the pair, a stalking technique called the Fox Trot.

Every time the deer looked her way, she froze, just as she had learned in our scouting exercises. The mother walked farther off, but the fawn stayed behind, nibbling the grass and my daughter got closer than she had ever been to a fawn. The deer did eventually notice her and run off, but my daughter cheered in triumph, feeling the privilege of being allowed to get so close.

The skills taught in scouting are meant to teach children first how to be better observers. Then they develop skills to make their way in the world as helpers and friends to all. The scouting motto is, be prepared, founded on Sir Baden Powell's initials. In his book, Scouting for Boys, he explains the motto in this way. Be prepared, which means you are always to be in a state of readiness, in mind and body, to do your duty. Be prepared in mind by having disciplined yourself to be obedient to every order, and also having thought out beforehand any accident or situation that might occur, so that you know the right thing to do at the right moment and are willing to do it. Be prepared in body by making yourself strong and active and able to do the right thing at the right moment and do it.

Most of us want to feel that we are making a difference in the world. But oftentimes we feel that the difference we need to make must be big. Something that the world will notice. Scouting teaches us that it is our duty to make the world immediately around us better. Because we are trained to see the needs of our community, because we train as a team, because we are eager to use our skills to help those around us, we know that the biggest difference we can make is right where we are. We learn the meaning of duty.

Again, from Sir Baden Powell. Because we are trained to see the needs of our community, because we train as a team, because we are eager to use our skills to help those around us, we know that the biggest difference we can make is right where we are. We learn the meeting of duty.

Again, from Sir Baden Powell. A scout's duty is to be useful and to help others. And he is to do his duty before anything else, even though he gives up his own pleasure or comfort or safety to do it.

When in difficulty to know which of two things to do, he must ask himself, which is my duty? That is, which is best for the other people and do that one. He must be prepared at any time to save life or to help injured persons and he must do a good turn to somebody every day.

In this particular scheme of scouting my hope is first to give families to start, an entry point into the story unfolding around them all the time. And then to offer a means and the desire to change the story for the better.



Julie -

Thank you for joining us today on the Charlotte Mason Show. I'm your host, Julie Ross, and I would love to meet you in person. All of the Great Homeschool Conventions have been rescheduled to 2021. Go to GreatHomeschoolConventions.com to find a convention near you.

But you don't have to wait until 2021 to experience the amazing speakers and vendors at the Great Homeschool Conventions. They now offer an online convention that you can find on GreatHomeschoolConventions.com.

Also, if you'd like the show notes for today's episode, go to homeschooling.mom. If you would take a moment to subscribe to this podcast in iTunes and leave a review, I would greatly appreciate it. It helps get the word out about this podcast to our audience.

Thanks for joining me today. Until next time, may your home be filled with books, beauty, and Biblical truth.

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