Girl Scouts

[Steve-O-68]

My partner (Neil, who's a new poster here) and I were recently approached by a Girl Scouts troop leader to give a fitness presentation to her troop. They are having a weekend 'Lock-in' and wanted the girls to learn about fitness and nutrition, how to incorporate good habits into daily life, etc.

We've got ideas for different kinds of exercises, healthy snacks, etc. I think our biggest dilema is we'll be working with girls aged 5 to 18. Any suggestions on how to get such a wide age range's attention and keep it?

Would getting some of the older girls to be our 'assistants' be a good idea? We're looking at around 30 girls.

I'm psyched to be given this opportunity, and I want it to be enjoyable and memorable for the girls. I don't want to lecture to them for 2+ hours.

Thoughts? Suggestions?

[Will Haskell]

Hey Steve,

An excellent question! Keep in mind that these are all school-aged kids and they get lectured 6-hours per day, 5-days per week---they quite possibly get lectured even more by mom and dad the second they get home. Point being, if you want to make it memorable, make it fun by making it less of a lecture, and more of a movement-based session.

My second suggestion would be to break them off into groups according to pre-, and mid-late adolescent girls. 5-11, 12-18--would be an example. Organize each topic and present it to the entire group by explaining the next task, then split off into your age groups to proceed.

**If you split the groups, place them back to back. All attention will be lost if you are trying to speak to a group of pre-adolescent females while the older group is directly behind you.

**Having the older girls as assistants is fine but, some of the girls may be a clueless as the pre-ads about what is going on, or they may not want to assist at all and you won't get much out of them.

**Talking about nutrition is important, however, you will be entering a very grey area. These kids don't buy the groceries for the house, have poor food choices at school, and probably won't specifically utilize any bit of nutritional information you give them. They all fall under mom and dad's rule and going too far against what mom and dad think could turn parents off from getting involved with you in the future. I realize that is a bit extreme, but not unlikely. 3 years ago I gave a presentation and talked about the importance of consuming water on a daily basis. Needless to say, I got a nasty phone call from a parent that said I was an idiot because water doesn't have any nutritional value and that her daughter is only allowed to drink juice and milk. Seriously...

Lastly, have one final activity that they can all do as a group. It can be as simple as a game of tag, obstacle course, or a warm-down activity.

Steve, I realize a lot of this is rather vague so the biggest piece of advice I can give you when dealing with this group is to act on their level. They are female kids...it's alright to goof around, have fun, etc. Those kids will unfortunately remember the experience based on how much fun they had, not how much they learned.

Have a good one, Steve.

Will Haskell
Athletic Development Specialist
www.athleterevolution.com
www.willhaskell.blogspot.com
www.athleticosportsperformance .com

[Steve-O-68]

Thanks Will! Great advice. I'll keep all of that in mind.

[finboy]

Good luck, bud. I love your new tag lines. You're such a stud. I don't have any good advice about your Girl Scouts gig other than to say I'm positive you will do a great job and don't suggest they drop the whole 'Girl Scout cookies thing'.

[Steve-O-68]

Thanks Fin! I would NEVER tell them to stop with the cookies! I can eat a whole box of the peanut butter cookies in one sitting!

[mom2w]

As a girl scout leader... last year we had a lady come in and just talk about what a healthy choice was vs sometimes choices for food/snacks. They may not buy the food, but trust me, when your kid says "can we buy carrots" you buy carrots! It's great when they come at it and ask rather than always offering and crossing your fingers. This lady also brought some music and did some fun exercises with our girls (they were kindergardners at the time). It was close to aerobics but kids need the movement stuff more than anything. Things like burpees, bodyweight squats, overhead "presses" and the like are easily done without looking like true weight training and they do love it. A core part of GS is to have the girls be "a sister to every girl scout" so having the older girls help out is a great idea. You could do things like jumping rope where the older ones teach the girls a game or twirl the rope. Just last week we bought each girl a cheap jump rope and then put on music and had them see who could jump the longest. Same thing works with hula hoops.

When my son was in boy scouts we had a nutrition night too. For that they made a big cut out of the food pyramid (I know, I know...) and had the boys bring different assigned foods to the meeting. Then they had to discuess where there food fell on the pyramid/food group charts. (in the end the food went to a local shelter)

Hope this helps a little bit. Oh, and if you google "girl scouts of America" there is a lot of information on their site or on troop sites about what they've done for similar meetings.

[LisaS]

you could look at the games section at GoAnimal for some movement ideas that you couild maybe use or adapt - use baseballs instead of med balls for instance -
if you have room, some of the running ones might be fun -
http://goanimal.com/games/games.html

also - if you mix up active activities - listening - quiet activities you'll probably hold attention better -

[Steve-O-68]

Excellent! Thank you ladies!