Getting the Most Out of Your Program
The Ranger, Pathfinder and Trex programs offer amazing opportunities for exploring issues and topics and trying new skills. Thinking about what you’d like to know before starting a challenge or activity will help you to understand why you are doing it, what you should learn from it and how it fits into your program. For example, going bowling is a fun activity to do with your unit. But why are you doing it? Do you want to learn more about the sport itself? If so, you could ask a regular bowler to join you and teach you some of the skills and techniques. Do you want to go bowling as a get-to-know-you activity? Then you would focus on team-building activities.
Thinking about your challenge beforehand gives your activities more direction and meaning.
All Questions Are Good Questions
Whether you’re bringing in a guest speaker or heading to an attraction such as a museum, you should have a pre-visit discussion to brainstorm questions and topics. Share your list with your guest speaker so that he or she will be prepared with the answers. Here are some questions to stimulate thinking:
- Why do we want to know this?
- What will we be able to do differently afterward?
- Whom could we share this information with?
- Here’s what we know; is this true?
- Are there other organizations that we could contact?
- What are we hoping to get out of this experience?
- What kind of equipment will we need?
- What if this gets too emotional?
Wrap It Up
After you’ve finished a challenge, discuss all the details, including the highlights and disappointments. Such a debriefing is a great way to relive the experience and to remember what you’ve learned. It also helps to determine whether you’d do it again and how to make it even better the next time.
Staying Together
There is no right or wrong way to keep in touch. It’s whatever works best for you and the other members. Some units meet every week, while others get together once a month and use e-mail to get work done in between.
Regardless of your unit’s arrangement, you will have to stay on track and on top of your program work. Try setting up a buddy system to keep everyone motivated. Use a “social whip” (someone to round up members the night before an event). Ensure you have a note taker to record what needs to be done and that the minutes are mailed out to everyone.
In the end, it all comes down to you: the more you put into it, the more you will get out of it!
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