Farewell

So, as we say farewell, we hope that our now completed Silver Award will have a lasting impact on you, our global community. We will continue to go on with Girl Scouts, and who knows, we might even earn the Gold Award. We will definitely let you know when we earn our Gold Awards. The only downside to the Gold Award is that we can't work as a group. So we will earn three individual Gold Awards. So, with this lasting memory of a project, we say goodbye (for now).Thank you so much for following our journey through the Silver Award.
~Jillian, Margaret, and Alison

Celebrate!

Hooray! This meeting we found out that we got our silver award! Next week we will officially recieve it and bridge to Seniors. All of that hard work finally paid off!
~Troop 60435

Paperwork

Today's meeting was completely devoted to finishing up official Silver Award paperwork.  We all finished writing around eight responses discussing what we did for our project, and how we felt we made a difference.  We answered questions such as "How did you reach outside the Girl Scout community?"  To that particular question, we answered... you guys!  All you readers out there, you are the ones who we reached out to outside the Girl Scout community!  We also presented our pro-peace workshop to kids at a local library, further getting our project out to those not in the Girl Scout community.  We are having our leaders sign off on our forms today, and then we are sending them in.  It's all really coming together; once we get our forms in, the next step is: Silver Award!  We're almost there, guys, and we're really excited!




~Troop 60435

Presentation Success, and Wrapping up!

So we apologize sincerely about not posting last week; we were on April vacation!  However, we would like to share that our first presentation of our pro-peace workshop was a monumental success!  All of the kids we presented to were engaged in the activities, and seemed to enjoy the games we played.  Hopefully, they were able to take away lessons about how to use and promote peace and kindness in their everyday lives.  With one presentation down, we have one to go!  Next week, we'll present to a younger Girl Scout troop.  At this week's meeting, we started on our Silver Award Final Report forms, writing essay responses about what we did to complete the Silver Award, and what we learned.  We'll keep you posted on next week's presentation results!  Stay tuned!





~Troop 60435

Rehearsal

Today was our last rehearsal before our presentation this Thursday.  We ran through our total presentation twice, and divided up all of the duties that go with our kit, such as who says what when.  We are getting very excited, and rather nervous as well.  We think that we're pretty well set for our presentation, and that we're going to nail it; the only thing that could use some work is the volume of our voices. Some of us need to remember to speak up!  But overall, we're well prepared, and ready to go!  Silver Award, here we come!



~Troop 60435

Assembling The Kits

Today's meeting was pretty much devoted to assembling the necessary materials for our peace kits.  It was an excellent lesson in working together... lots of communication had to happen, to make sure we each knew what the other one was doing!  As of right know, we are working on editing and writing the information that will go into our actual kits.  Trust me, it's a long process.  But all of the information is really meaningful, so it's enjoyable to read.  And it's almost as fun to create pro-peace games as it is to play them!  We have 172 days until our Silver Award is due, so it's crunch time, baby!

~Troop 60435

Step 6: Develop Your Project

The sixth step in the Silver Award Pyramid is "Develop Your Project." With the development of this blog, we have fulfilled this step.  As we have traveled on this journey, we have developed all three of our projects: the blog, the podcast, and the presentation.  This step included lots of brainstorming... our troop never just does something, we plan it!  This step was the last in our Silver Award, and we're not completely finished with it yet.  We haven't finished the presentation or the podcast, but we will soon!  As this is our last week of posting the Pyramid steps, next week you'll be in for a surprise when you see what we post!

~Troop 60435

Updated Pyramid

Breaking news!  Recently, the Girl Scout Silver Award pyramid has been modified.  Remember our first post, about the Pyramid?  We had eight steps in our post.  Well, now the Pyramid only has six steps!  The last two steps, "Make a plan and put it into motion," and "Reflect and celebrate," have gotten the cut.  The first six steps, though, are exactly the same, fortunately!  So, to refresh your memory, the Pyramid now looks like this:

1. Go on a journey.
2. Identify issues you care about.
3. Build your team.
4. Identify issues in your community.
5. Pick your take-action project.
6. Develop your project.

Fewer steps is alright with us!  Although... now we have only two weeks of posting our steps left!
~ Troop 60435

Step 2: Identify Issues You Care About

Step 2 in the pyramid is "Identify Issues You Care About."  We did this step individually, but also as a troop.Some of the issues in the world we decided we care about:

1.) Bullying - We decided that we don't want to be bullied, and neither do other people.  As mentioned in our aMAZE post, everyone deserves the right to be accepted.  Bullying prevents world-wide acceptance, which is why we think that pro-peace is an important cause to fight for.

2.) Global Warming - Once our atmosphere is destroyed, there is nothing we can do to fix it.  What will the world come to?  Recycling or a recycling project would be a good way to solve on millionth of this enormous problem, which is why we considered a project such as this for our Silver Award.

3.) Lack of Education - Children need a proper education.  Without proper knowledge of the world and society around them, children are seriously stunted in their ability to go through life in an informed and connected.  Ignorance is not bliss.  Perhaps obliviousness is bliss, but ignorance certainly isn't.  We weren't sure how we could remedy this issue, which is why we decided to leave such an important topic to the professionals.

~Troop 60435

The Pyramid

To complete the Silver Award, you are required to follow a set of steps called, by us, the Pyramid.  The steps are:
1. Complete a Journey
2. Identify issues you care about
3. Build your Girl Scout Silver Award team
4. Explore your community
5. Pick your take-action project
6. Develop your project
7. Make a plan and put it into motion
8. Reflect, share your story, and celebrate.

We will be posting about how we completed these steps every week, beginning next week. Then we will all individually post further explanations and our opinions, as well as why this project and mission statement is important to each of us.

~ Troop 60435

Welcome!

Check out our brand new blog!  During the next couple of months, we will be publishing posts at the end of each of our Girl Scout meetings, documenting our Silver Award project, giving you links, books, ideas, pictures, and sharing podcasts related to our mission with you, our trusty followers!

~Troop 60435