Hello everyone!
Like yesterday, this is a long one, but worth the read if you have a Thursday scout! (After this week, the girls are done with their take-action projects and the two meeting days will be back to identical meetings.)
Before anything else though, let me extend the biggest of THANK YOU'S to Mr. Sula for his help today. Unfortunately because of a perfect storm of late nights at work, family tragedies, and extended hours, parent help was scarce. But thanks to Mr. Sula we were able to make the meeting work, and keep everything on track.
Another thank you also goes to Mrs. Patneaude, and Mrs. Skibicki, for coming when they could. And a final thank you goes to the girls themselves who understood that it was super important to be respectful and on-task today.
Thursday's group of girls had decided that they were going to take action by working on projects to help teach kids to not start smoking. Earlier they had made posters, and met with girls from the Greendale High School anti-smoking group. We also decided that when the weather gets warm and drier, we're going to write anti-smoking messages in chalk on the sidewalks around the school.
Today, we learned ways that we can be anti-smoking advocates when people ask us why we shouldn't smoke. We also made videos of projects we did that demonstrate the health effects of smoking. IMPORTANT NOTE: While the subject of our project was anti-smoking, the real lesson for the girls to learn was that they can take action and make a difference on an issue of their choice no matter what age they are.
The 4 demonstrations we taught the girls were:
1) Cigarettes constrict your blood vessels.
We demonstrated this by breaking into two teams. Each girl got a little bottle of water. But one team got regular width straws (the non-smoking team!) and the other team got small-diameter coffee-stirring straws. The two teams raced to see who could drink the most water through their straw in 5 seconds.
The girls saw that the bigger straws were able to carry more water, just like bigger veins and arteries can carry more blood (and oxygen) through our bodies.
2) Cigarette smoking can restrict our airways.
The girls demonstrated restricted airways with another race!
The girls split into two teams, and each team got an air pump with a balloon on it. One pump was unrestricted, for the non-smoking team. The other pump for the smoking team, had its air hose clamped partially shut. Then every girl on each team got 5 seconds to inflate their balloon using the pump. The girls were able to see that a restricted airway made a big difference in how much air their lungs could get to breathe. The non-smoking team filled, 2, 3, or even more balloons when the restricted-breathing, smoking group wasn't even able to fill one!
3) Tar from cigarettes can prevent oxygen from making it to our muscles.
The girls demonstrated this with yet another race!
The girls split into groups of three girls. One girl held the oxygen (represented by a measuring cup of water). One girl held the lungs (represented by a funnel with a coffee filter in it). The third girl represented the muscles, by holding a beaker to collect the "oxygen."
But then some of the groups got their lungs all "tarry" by pouring caramel syrup into their coffee filters.
The groups poured their "oxygen" through their "lungs" and raced to see whose "muscles" got all the oxygen first.
They saw that the tar-covered lungs let the oxygen through much more slowly than the clean lungs did.
We talked about how important oxygen is to our bodies, and why it is important for oxygen to be able to get from our lungs to our muscles.
4) Cigarettes can lower lung capacity.
The girls all measured their lung capacity by displacing water from an inverted 2 liter bottle. The girls had a great time seeing who had the biggest lung capacity. They talked about how being able to breathe more oxygen meant you could run farther and faster, and play more without having to stop to take "breathing breaks." (Special nods to Alexis, Sophia, Lara, and Katie who had the highest lung capacities of the group!)
I have some raw footage of the girls doing the demonstrations, but it might take a while to edit into useable tape. When that's ready though, I'll send it over your way. The girls were excited about sharing their stories of the demonstrations to other people and being able to explain some of the ways cigarettes are unhealthy.
After learning the demonstrations, we took some time thinking about ourselves as characters in stories, and made ourselves official Personal Crests, just like fantasy heroes! The girls all picked three personal characteristics and drew symbols to represent them on a coat-of-arms. We took turns guessing what traits the girls symbols represented. I was so proud that so many of our girls see themselves as brave, strong, and smart!
Finally, we all took a moment and reflected on how we've learned and grown during this storytelling journey and got our journey patches. As on Wednesday there were some great reflections from the girls, and saved some to share with you:
"I learned about not to smoke because it is bad for you and your lungs. And I also learned how to spot a problem, and then to take action and fix it."
"I learned you should always be nice, kind, and loving, and believe in yourself."
"I learned about taking hold of my dream and going into the spotlight. I learned about being myself, and being who I want to be. Everyone can be a character in their own story."
"I learned to make the world a better place, and to make things better. I learned to keep your lungs healthy by not smoking. To be strong and if we see a problem that I am strong enough and smart enough to try to fix it."
In summary, for the Thursday group, here's how our Agent of Change/Girl Scout Story journey went:
We started by listening to stories from other cultures and learning how different cultures and people through time and around the globe have used stories to teach lessons and pass along knowledge.
We moved on to thinking about ourselves as characters in the story of our lives, and thinking about how we face challenges and situations in the world, in our community in our schools, and in our homes just like storybook characters do.
From there we spent time choosing a problem that as a group we could take action on and make a difference with. We chose to work on helping students at our schools not start smoking. We invited students from anti-smoking groups at Greendale High School to help us come up with ideas to take action. With the help of the GHS students, we decided to make posters, write things in chalk around the school sidewalks, and do a play or sketch or demonstration for the kids at our schools to teach about the dangers of smoking. We then made posters to get a quick start on taking action!
Finally, today, we made our demonstration videos and learned how to put on anti-smoking demonstrations that illustrate the effects of smoking on our bodies.
That was also one great journey!
Aleks Skibicki
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