Troop Junior Leader Training

Course Outlines, Materials and Resources for the Scouter

How often have we heard, or said ourselves, something along the following lines?

...the JLT's would become mundane and boring (repetitive) or the Scoutmaster would have too big a job cut out for him in keeping the JLT's fresh and interesting for everybody all the time.

Or...

On that subject, does anyone out there have another idea for training Jr. Leaders? We have a 'smallish' Troop, and most of our boys have attended the BSA prepackaged JLT. It doesn't work really well if they know *how* you're picking that stupid magazine before you even start, and how many times can you play the potato game and keep it fresh....

Ideas?? ...

Most of us have the same problem. The success, and limitations, of the BSA Junior Leader Training Kit really highlighted the situation for me. As a result, for a Wood Badge ticket item I developed a troop-level junior leader training program for my troop. I have tried the program ideas in my troop with encouraging results. While long on direction, and short on actual materials, I believe it provides a philosophy and comprehensive approach to the subject that will clear much of the haze for unit leaders. It allows us to break the task of formal training into pieces that are understandable, manageable and effective, yet manage a total training program for our scouts.

Many of the elements in this program will be familiar to Scouters, as they have been gathered from many sources. I believe, however, the training progam presented here assembles them into an effictive approach to a formal troop level training program. Scouters are free to use the ideas presented here in your unit training programs as you wish to meet your needs.

Some materials are provided here for your use. I have gathered ideas and materials from many sources, but time is scarce at present to bring them together into a presentable format. I will make them available as they are completed. However, many good ideas and material for training modules may be gleaned from a wide variety of sources. The material in the Junior Leader Handbook may be covered as modules. The Junior Leader Training section of the Scoutmaster Handbook has a long list of ideas near the end of the chapter. Let your unit's needs be your guide.

Please review these materials and send any ideas, criticisms or comments to me. And especially additional module materials. Below I have included some of my thoughts behind the program, for whatever benefit they may be.

Steve

Steve Tobin, Scouter
Hampton, MN

JLT Materials

Junior Leader Training Program - An outline for a Troop Junior Leader training program.

Troop Junior Leader Training Session 1 - A day or weekend course that covers the fundamentals.

JLT Course PC Slide Presentation - in MS Power Point and Lotus Freelance Graphics.

Basic Leadership Challenge - Course Book By Thomas C. Nulf. From Troop 26 - Tulsa, Oklahoma. A course to train Scouts to lead and manage people.

The BSA JLT Course - An evaluation and ideas from Scouts-L.

Leadership in Scouting - An article by Charles Stafford

Leadership Skills - A summary of the 11 points from Leadership Training.

Thoughts on the Troop JLT Program

I'm no particular expert on scout leadership training. As a new Scout leader, with Fast Start and SM Basic training under my belt, I knew I was supposed to be training my scout leaders. So I began looking around for how to go about this *Leadership Training* thing. Going to my first line of support, the leadership training material in the Scoutmaster Handbook consists of 17 pages of very condensed and largely undecipherable instructions. I did pick up the concept of the New Leader Conference, which was a good start. But the material on the weekend JLT session was mostly lost on me. I didn't have a clue how to put what little I understood into a training presentation.

So I did the obvious thing... I got someone else to do it for me. A neighboring angel, disguised as Scouter Jim Forrest, came in and did a training program with my scouts. Twice. And it was wonderful. Jim is an outstanding trainer, for both adults and boys, so we all learned and had fun and got things off to a great start for my troop.

But, unfortunately, I couldn't do what Jim did. I have it on good authority that he has been training scouts since Moses was a Cub Scout. The new troop leader, on the other hand, is generally not experienced or educated in youth leadership training. Many troops have lost their experienced adult leaders, or are new startups, and it is the brand new Scoutmaster in the shiny pants that has to do the training. It is important to enable that new scout leader to be effective from the start. This leader needs a step-by-step set of materials to guide them through their initial efforts.

This is what I really liked about the BSA Scoutmaster's JLT Training Kit when it was introduced. It lays it all out for you; who, what when, where, why and how. It tells you what to do and say, and for extra measure they even put some of it on video tape for you. My first formal junior leader training program used this program, and it went very well for both the boys and me. I learned as much, or more, than the scouts did. Not as much fun as Jim's sessions, but it got the job done.

When I ran the program the next year, a couple of troublesome points came out. First, many of the Scouts in the second course were also in the first one, so I used new games with similar goals. Even so, I was constantly bumping into their boredom threshold. It turns out that the foundation of the training method used here is derived from what is called "the discovery process". Or, what happens when "the light comes on." There isn't much "discovery" when the scout has seen it before, so the interest level suffers. I also saw the need to cover additional material not in the BSA course, and needed a method to work it into the program. And the last section in the SM JLT course on Continuing Training emphasizes how important it is, but is pretty short on what to do next.

So I decided to make junior leader training one of my Wood Badge ticket items. I pulled together everything I could find available to the lay-Scouter, and ended up with a set of diverse training exercises, techniques and ideas. But nothing that resembled a program that the Scout leader could use for a wide range of ages. I tried to find a way to keep the basic program fresh and interesting each time, while meeting the needs of both the younger and older scouts, with little success.

After awhile it became clear that the troop pretty much needs to run the same, basic, training course every year for the new scouts and junior leaders that come in. The material we need to cover for this group isn't going to change substantially from year to year, and I couldn't really find any "new and improved" methods of presentation to keep it fresh for scouts that are repeating the course.

So the short answer to the problem is that we don't try. We design the troop JLT program specifically for the new leader, who has never seen it before, run it when needed, and leave it at that. But instead of being the beginning and end of our troop training, it is now but one part of a training syllabus that addresses the needs of the scout as he progresses and gains leadership experience.

The leadership training process begins when we sit down with our new Webelos transfers and explain the operation of their new patrol, what the scout leaders do, and how the troop functions. It progresses through the patrol elections and the explanation of their importance. Then the SM new leader conference with the newly elected leader, and the troop JLT program. So far, so good. Now what do we do once this foundation is in place? The solution, I think, is two-fold.

The first step is to put the "experienced", trained scouts to work teaching the basic material to the younger scouts. There are two benefits for these scouts. First, this is new leadership training for them in that it develops and exercises their leadership skills through the teaching process. Second, the best way to really learn material is to have to teach it to someone else. (Try to teach someone a knot that you are shaky on yourself :^) They get exposed to the material again, but in a new, more directly involved way. Put the Troop Guide and Instructors to work teaching the new Scouts, running the troop elections and JLT program. While this is a standard part of the Scouting program, viewing and using it as an element of our training program will help us make it more effective.

The second part is in the training modules. This is a method for the troop Scouter to identify, organize, design and schedule training topics. A module can consist of a 5 or 10 minute session with the PLC, an exercise for a troop meeting or campout, or it can be a weekend outing with the Leadership Corps. This can be the way to manage formal troop-level training for the scouts once they have been through the troop JLT program. Modules can be presented at any point in time as they are designed to be stand-alone, or you can break down larger topics into a series of easy to digest modules. Modules can be selected based on current troop needs or problems, or implemented on a planned rotation basis. And again, the more experienced scouts can be given the task of teaching and/or implementing these modules as part of their ongoing training. This would lead a scout towards attending the Council level JLTC program and beyond.