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Wood Badge is the most advanced training available for Scout Leaders who are involved in the programs of the Boy Scouts of America.
Come join The Wood Badge course at Black Creek Scout Reservation. The dates are March 8th-10th and April 19th-21st. The Cost is $200 for those who sign up before Feb. 1st 2012 and $225 after this date. Please contact the Coastal Empire Council at 912-927-7272.
Space is limited and going fast; today is the day to join the Wood badge for the 21st century course!
REGISTER HERE!
What is Wood Badge?
Wood Badge is a training course for Scouters, which finally results in their receiving a certificate, a small neckerchief, a leather slide, and two small wooden beads on a leather thong. Lord Baden-Powell, the founder of Scouting, directed the first course in 1919 and gave each of the participants one of the beads, which he had captured, from the African chieftain Dinizulu. Thus did the course name develop, for its symbol was literally a badge of wood. Wood Badge is Scouting's premier training course. Baden-Powell designed it so that Scouters could learn in as practical a way possible the skills and methods of Scouting. It is first and foremost, learning by doing. The members of the course are formed into patrols and these into a troop. The entire troop lives in the out-of-doors for a week camping; cooking their own meals, and practicing their Scout skills. The uniqueness of Scouting is the patrol method. The use of the natural gang of six or eight boys who elect their own leader and plan and carry out many of their own activities is a democracy in microcosm. Here young men learn the give and take of working with people, as they must surely do all their lives. Here too, they are given leadership and learning opportunities, which prepare them for their future roles as citizens. It is for this reason that it is so crucial that all adults understand thoroughly the patrol method. Thus it was that Baden-Powell developed a practical course built around the operation of a troop and its patrols. Yet this is only the most well known of three parts in the entire Wood Badge experience. The practical course--the week in the out-of-doors--was originally scheduled to follow a "theoretical" part 1, which consisted of answering a series of questions about the aims and methods of the Scouting program. Part 2 then followed the practical course and required a 6-month application period while the Scouter practiced in his home Scouting situation what he had learned in parts 1 and 2. In actual practice, once Wood Badge became available in the United States, the theoretical questions and the application were carried out simultaneously after the practical course was taken.
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