Team-building skills learned from my Scout-Guide Teacher
Several schools have Scouts & Guide Programme in their school curriculum. It empowers students with the various necessary skills, such as communication, leadership, teamwork, and survival skills. It also helps them to manage and survive in any condition. The present essay narrates the significance of Scout & Guides and the role of my scout Guide teacher in developing team-building skills.
Introduction
School education helps students in their overall growth mentally as well as physically. Only academic education is not enough for them. They remain engaged in classroom activities like reading, writing, etc. so, it is also necessary to involve them in some physical activities and other life skills. When I was a student, there was a subject Scouts and Guides in my Course curriculum. It is still available in some schools as a part of the curriculum and is very popular among school students.Scout and Guides and its significance in life
Scouting and Guiding is a voluntarily educational movement for young and adults and is open to all. Anyone can participate in the Scouts and Guides without discrimination of gender, caste, race or any religion. Scouts are for boys, and Guides are for girls' students. The Scouts and Guides teach the students teamwork, loyalty, ethics, leadership skills, patriotism, etc. It also builds self-confidence among students and helps in their physical, mental, emotional, social, and intellectual development, which plays an important role in building a productive society.My Scouts and Guides teacher
Scout-Guide teachers educate kids for a better future by teaching them the skills they need to become valuable members of their communities. He/she teaches students the laws and promises of Scouts and Guides. He/she helps in building the character of a student by developing self-esteem, confidence, punctuality, teamwork, leadership skills, communications skills, etc. They also teach scouts and Guides adventures training, outdoor skills, life/survival skills, health and safety, so they will become aware of their full potential and survive in any difficult situation. He/she teaches the students about behaviour management and personality development and helps to build a better person. As a result, a better society can be developed. Our teacher was a trained Guide Captain. She made us aware of Scout Guide, its history, laws, promise, flag, etc. She gave us training and helped us to develop physical and mental strength, skills and character. She also inculcated patriotism in our hearts.Her approach to team-building skills development
As she was a Scout-Guide teacher, her focus was on team-building skills. She used to free us from the narrow limits of the study. In our class, the total strength was 40, and she grouped us into five teams of 8 students each. Her main motive for making teams was to teach us to work in teams naturally. So, we worked as a team together in cooperation and became active group members. She did not instruct us but guide us. Hence, we used to work as a self-organised team. Each team was called a patrol based on the patrol system of Scouts and Guides. She explained to us the importance of the patrol group and also told us that it is a self-contained unit. Teams had selected their team leaders themselves, and our teacher helped with the selection. For this, she gave us some helpful tips like how to choose a good team leader? What kind of qualities should we search for in a team leader? In what ways we can help our team leader? Each unit member was assigned different task by his/her team leader such as keeping records, keeping things organised, organise routine duties, organise quiz/games, helping members, especially new members, checking uniforms. Our teacher also motivated us to create a lively environment and helped us to organise games. We used to have a general discussion regularly as well. She encouraged us to organise different kinds of activities. As our team was of Guides, we did other activities also like cooking, singing, dancing, art & craft, etc. She used to ask about our experiences after each activity and also discussed problems. When we joined a Scout & Guide Camp with our teacher
Our school's Scout and Guide Club organised a three-day camp, which was led by our Scout-Guide Teacher. She engaged us in different activities. She was very strict with her rules. We used to wake up early in the morning and start our work on time. It developed a sense of punctuality and disciplines us. She developed a positive attitude among us through her positive talk. She used to give us a challenge daily and also checked our progress. After completing the challenge, she used to appreciate us. We learnt to make tents, types of knots like a square knot, reef knot, double fisherman knot, sheet bend, double sheet band, clove hitch, trucker's hitch, timber hitch, prusik hitch, bowline, etc. These knots are very helpful to tie anything properly and can be used in an emergency, even to save someone's life. In that camp, she also taught us about first aid, burning fire, survival skills in harsh conditions with minimum resources, laws of Scouts & Guides. We also had several fun activities. Scouts and Guides taught us how to live our lives honestly, respectfully and courageously, build a constructive society and serve our nation.Conclusion
Scouts and Guides have a four-fold aim which includes character formation, good health habits development, vocational/handicraft training and development of true spirit among students to make them good citizens. Thus, Scouts and Guides are helpful in the overall development of a student. And, my Scouts-Guides teacher played her role honestly, with full dedication. I feel happy that I got a chance to join Scout-Guide and learn in my school under her guidance.
After reading this article I remembered my school days. I also participated very actively in the scout movement during my high school studies. My social teacher is my scout teacher also. My father's brother was also a scouts and guides teacher. Those days in our school NCC was not compulsory. We had the option of choosing between NCC and the Scouts.
The highest rank is President's scout and only a few students will get qualified for this. I was lucky in getting the same when I was in my ninth class. My teacher used to spend time with us after school hours and he used to train us. He used to make us play some games which makes us know the importance of teamwork. We attended inter-school, inter-district and interstate camps. Those days he made us get trained in many activities.
We used to go and work as volunteers when some meetings or functions are taking place on the school campus. < The participation in this gave us very good discipline. The teacher was asking us to write the life histories of some leaders who worked for the country and he used to tell us the lessons to be learnt from the histories of such people.