Hampshire Scouts are supporting Murray Parish Trust’s Hares of Hampshire sculpture trail in the summer of 2022. Just because the hares and leverets have hopped away It isn’t too late to earn your badge! To earn the badge we recommend (for Beavers and Cubs) to complete 3 activities each from the 3 sections. You may want to do less with squirrels or more with Scouts and Explorers or adapt the challenges, it’s up to you – it’s about taking part more than doing exactly the same.
Badges are available from shop.bvr.org.uk for £2 each or £1.50 if you order at least 10 (in any combination) and are available in Squirrel, Beaver, Cub, Scout, Sea Scout, Explorer and Adult uniforms and are approved as occasional badges which can be worn on uniform.
| The March Hare | |
| Badge Links | BVR creative, cooks, health and fitness, creative challenge |
| Challenges | Make and decorate bunny biscuits Create decorations for a “mad hatters tea party” include march hare masks and hats Create and make a menu filled with munchies the march hare would like to eat (don’t forget the carrots) Learn how to make a “proper” cup of tea Create a hare themed invitation to invite a friend to you march hare tea party A craft or food item agreed by your leader |
| Hop to it | |
| Badge Links | BVR Creative challenge, Health and fitness |
| Challenges | Play some hare/rabbit themed games (sleeping bunnies, leap hare(frog) etc) Learn and sing bunny related songs (little bunny foo foo, Hare um scare um (loony toons song)) Look at the Hare and the tortoise story Hare related problem-solving skills (maze to the carrot, hare, carrot and the fox across the river) Sponsored hop Another Activity agreed by your leader |
| Homes for hares | |
| Badge Links | BVR explore, builder, animal friend, creative |
| Challenges | Find out about wild hare habitats, food and family make up Find out about domestic bunny care Design and build a fantasy hare house Go for a hike in nature and see if you can spot Hare/bunny tracks, poo, nests Create a colony hare collage using natural materials Another Activity agreed by your leader |
Download the challenge sheet here
Buy the badges here
8 October – Basingstoke Districts
15/16 October- Everyone else
This year we have the exciting opportunity to return to Paultons Park for a day of adventure! A firm staple of the Hampshire Beavers calendar we are excited to still have this on the calendar but as with last year but there are a few differences:
• A lower than usual ticket allocation while Paultons ramp up their capacity
• We may not be able to offer additional Young Leaders to support ratios, this will be reviewed in September. You can of course bring your own Young Leaders, any over 16 count as responsible adults for ride ratios.
• If arriving by parent drop off this must be completed by 09:15. The gardens will be open early for us to look round while waiting for the main park access at 10:00. Arrivals together by coach or minibus aren’t affected by this. This is to reduce congestion in the carpark and entrance forecourt
Rides are open 10:00 - 17:00 each day.
We still have a 1:6 ratio of free tickets for leaders (based on paid Beavers). This is a strict 1:6 ratio, so for example 10 Beavers gets 1 free leader place, 13 would get 2 free leader places. The system will work this out for you and discount the appropriate number of free leaders.
Annual Pass Holders can come, you just need to add £1 per pass holder to cover the badge, you can also order extra badges this way.
The cost of the day is £24.50 per paid place to include entry and the exclusive badge. As mentioned for every 6 paid Beavers attending you get one free leader place.
Booking is through our event booking system at bvr.org.uk/Paultons2022 Please make sure you make payment swiftly as places are only confirmed on receipt of payment. We do still have reduced number compared to previous years so make sure you don’t miss out!
We will also be having an exciting badge design competion! This could be a good summer project, entries can be sent directly to us or through you but either way must reach us by 31/08. Please see the links below
Direct entries
Via Leaders
As ever if you have any questions let me know!
We are into week 4 of the Hares of Hampshire sculpture trail for Murray Parish Trust. It has been great seeing adults and children discovering our 3 leverets amongst the other wonderful sculptures in Winchester. It has been even better seeing Scouting groups get involved, have you taken your Beavers yet?
The trail is on from June 16th to August 25th so don't hang about. The team have made a trail pack which builds upon the information available from Murray Parish Trust to give a complete route starting and finishing at the railway station so perfect for colonies arriving from all over the county. The trail pack can be downloaded here.
To raise the funds for our 3 leverets (information on all three is available here) we have a range of exciting badges featuring proud hares wearing their uniform, available for all sections from Squirrels to Network for only £2 each with at least £1 per badge going to the charity through our sponsorship of the 3 leverets (and any additional profit going to them too). The badges are approved as occasional badges so can be worn on our uniforms. You can purchase the badges here.
The best way you can get involved is to take to the streets and go out spotting. When you spot any of our three leverets why not tag us on social media? Use #HSLeverets or find the leverets directly on Twitter or Instagram at @HSLeverets
If you can't make it to Winchester you can still get involved! There are sculptures in Southampton too, or you can host a hare themed picnic.
Around The World Camp 2022 is Hampshire Beaver Scouts' County Beaver Scout Weekend Camp. It will be held during the weekend of 18-19 June 2022.
Building on the success of our events in 2017 and 2019 (and for some reason delayed from 2021) we are back at Ferny Crofts in the New Forest for a chance from Beavers to come together from across the county for a weekend of fun. Beavers will have the chance to take part in adventurous activities including climbing, crafty fun and also explore the world without leaving the county!
Beavers will be on site Saturday morning until after lunch on Sunday with leaders able to arrive on Friday evening to set up if they wish. The cost of the camp is £35 per Beaver Scout to include camping, activities, goody bag and t-shirt. Catering is available optionally for an additional £12 per person (to include Saturday lunch and dinner and Sunday breakfast and lunch). Leaders are £10 each including goodies and the t-shirt is optional at £6.
Leaders will need to register their interest using this system and send a deposit of £10 per participant. The deposit is due within 2 weeks of booking to secure your places. Click here to register the interest of your group.
If you have any questions regarding Around The World Camp 2022 please contact [email protected]
Book now at bvr.org.uk/world
**The design competition has now closed this page will be updated with badge and trail info soon**
After 4 successful years of Ginormous Teddy Bears’ Picnics for Murray Parish Trust we are very excited to be joining in with their next adventure (as well as hopefully some more picnics!). In the summer of 2022 there will be a trail of Hares around Winchester and Southampton, similar to Southampton’s previous Zebra and Rhino trails, which anyone can go and find. Hampshire Beavers and Cubs are joining in and will be sponsoring 3 of the leverets (baby hares) that will also be part of the trail in Winchester. One of our leverets will be on the trail looking smart in his uniform while the others will be designed as part of competitions open to Beavers and Cubs.
We will also be making resources to encourage colonies and packs to visit Winchester to see all the hares and leverets. (we will make resources for the older sections too and the Southampton trail though our leverets will be in Winchester). Once the trail is over the 3 leverets will be ours to keep so I am sure they will love the chance to go on tour around the county.
I can now launch the exciting design competition to find the look for our Hampshire Beavers leveret! The winning design will be created by some amazing artists ready to be seen on the trail in the summer. I need entries by 4th March to ensure we can get them made in time. There are 2 different forms below, one that would be good to use as home work or a half-term holiday project which can be sent back to us here (Direct) or one that can be used in you colony. Either way entries have to get back to us by 4th March so if you want entries to go through you set an earlier deadline (Colony). Entries can then be emailed to [email protected]
Hampshire Beavers Leveret Design Competition - Direct entries
Hampshire Beavers Leveret Design Competition - Colony entries
All,
As we navigate these interesting times the team and I was rather hoping that I could you could assist us in finding a way of making it easy for you lovely Leaders in getting more Beavers through their Chief Scout Bronze Award?
This would help in addressing HQ’s aspiration of getting at least half the Young People in the association, their top award by 2023.
Just a reminder that for a Beaver Scout to achieve their Chief Scout Bronze Award, they need to complete all the current challenge awards
• My world challenge
• My skills challenge
• My outdoors challenge
• My adventure challenge
• Teamwork challenge
• Personal challenge
As well as achieve any four activity or staged activity badges.
With that in mind, may I ask you to respond to the survey questions below, it should take less than 10 minutes and will greatly benefit the County team in helping you.
Please put your District, Group and Contact details on all responses and thank you ever so much. This is thinking mainly about non-Covid times which we hope are gradually returning, we know Covid will have added additional challenges but that is not the purpose of this survey.
Visit bit.ly/3sbujpf to complete the survey.
Yours In Scouting
Michael Collins
ACC Beavers
As Scouts we love to get outdoors and try new things. But with winter and everything going on, we know its hard to think of ideas of what to do right now. To help you deliver great online Scouting, we’ve pulled together our list of places to find great ideas.
These two sources of activities are much newer so you may not have heard much about them yet. Both of them are prepared by Scout leaders for Scout leaders and you can pick them up and run them with your section without much planning or adaptation needed.
Press Play and Go activities are made by HQ and have a video activity you can share with your Zoom session directly with the video doing all the work. New activities arrive every week and there are activities for Beavers/Cubs and Scouts/Explorers.
1st Digital Scouts is the new kid on the block with videos by Scout Content. These videos are nice and short, follow a good structure for zoom sessions, and give you up front what you’ll need. There are weekly videos for Beavers, Cubs, Scouts and Explorers ready to go.
Across the UK there are loads of other leaders looking for ideas and sharing what they’ve found in various different Facebook groups. 1st Virtual Scout Group on Facebook and 1st Facebook Scout Group are the big ones. The posts in these groups are easily searchable and linked together in topics.
There are lots of activities out there including PowerPoints for activities, games, escape rooms and links to more external resources. Lots of charities are offering activities that can work over Zoom, the RNLI being a good example, and there are many guest presenters that leaders can invite to show off their skills or animals or whatever!
So you may know about the new Scouts Activities tool already – it replaced the old Programmes on a Plate and is linked to the Programme Planning Tool that HQ is building and adding to. Throughout this weird time, the Scouts and the partners have been adding to this Activity index and adding new filters to make it searchable – so you can look at just online activities for example.
More usefully though, these activity listings can also be found on the pages for different badges on the Scout websites. At the bottom of these pages, below the badge requirements, is a box with activities that can be used to tick off these requirements. While some might need tweaking, there are lots of activities that you can use to get things started.
Scoutadelic are a YouTube channel run by Scout leaders and they make great videos teaching lots of different scouting skills from first aid to campfire songs.
Chester Zoo have made lots of resources and activities to support people at home, with fun activities, spotting the signs of your animal visitors and more practical experiences pitched at lots of different age ranges.
Scout Adventures have long made resources to support leaders with practical Scout skills and their page also has some smashing recipes as well.
The Scouts have put together some virtual programme support webinars, to help with the basics of running a putting over Zoom if you're feeling unsure about how it will all work.
Do you need help with getting your section to meet and take part in activities or can you offer support to another group? Please do reach out and contact our programme team, who are always happy to help provide support!
scouts.org.uk/volunteers/staying-safe-and-safeguarding/risk-assessments
We all do risk assessments or safety checks everyday, for example, when we cross the road. We choose an appropriate place to cross, look both ways and make a decision about whether it’s safe to cross.
We know that children and young people learn by doing. Activities encourage the development of young people and they can feel a huge sense of achievement in completing them. We want to provide EXCITEMENT but not DANGER; ADVENTURE but not HAZARD.
Risk Assessment starts in the early stages of activity planning and goes on throughout the activity until all participants go home at the end of the activity. There are five simple steps. If you’ve done risk assessments elsewhere, these should look familiar.
Click here for the Hampshire Scouts Pennant template
Hampshire Scouts have embarked on a new project involving every Section, Group and Unit in Hampshire, bringing us all together as we start to return to normal Scouting. The idea is for each Section, Group and Unit to create a pennant so we can join them together and display them at Activity Centre locations and future events.
We would like your Section, Group or Unit to design and draw these pennants, using the provided template. For your pennant, we would like your young people to draw a picture on the front of something they enjoy within Scouts, or something they are looking forward to doing. On the back of the pennant, please can you include some information about your Section, Group or Unit (your Section/Group name and Group logo/badge) and the first names (no last names) of the young people within your Section, Group or Unit (this can be handwritten or typed). Please send in your ONE chosen pennant per Section.
We will leave the activity up to you to plan, but this could be done face to face (following the COVID guide lines) or virtually. One idea would be to run it as a competition, where each young person designs the front of the pennant and a winner is chosen. This can also count towards certain badges, like the creative activity badge.
Once you have drawn your pennant, please copy it and keep a copy for your Section/Group/Unit, then please email it to us at [email protected] If you would like to see your pennant displayed at our Christmas event, please send them in by the 5th December 2020.
If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected]
click here to see an example Programme-Pixies-Pennant.pdf
Did you know there is a newsletter for all our wonderful Beaver Scout Leaders across Hampshire?
This is in addition to the Hampshire Scouts Update and is published roughly monthly or when we have some exciting news. It is available to Assistant District Commisioners, Leaders and any other adults or Young Leaders in the Beaver Scouts section.
Click here to sign up for the leaders newsletter.
