My kindergartner has had a year of thrills so far.
After tagging along to elementary school since she was in the womb, she finally got to go this year as a bona fide student. She was ecstatic. And now? After tagging along to all her older sister’s Girl Scout meetings and field trips, she’s finally a Daisy scout. She’s so excited.
Since I already lead an older girl troop, I figured I might as well lead the Daisies, too. I kind of have an idea of the things that work now and the things to skip or tweak, so hopefully this time around will be even better than the first. Poor older kids, having to be my guinea pigs until I get things figured out.
And because I know how hard it is to come up with ideas for meetings, I thought it might be helpful to share what we did at our first Girl Scout Daisy meeting with you!
One of my biggest goals for scout meetings is to make them different from school. We meet right after school, and some of the kindergartners go full day, so the last thing they want to do is sit and do worksheets or color. I try to make sure we have a game, a snack, some songs — fun things that get them moving. We did do a little bit of sitting, but we try to keep it to a minimum.
We started our meeting with a snack that the girls helped me make. Since this is Girl Scouts, we made S’Mores Trail Mix. Very simple, no prep work ahead of time, and easy for the girls to help with.
S’Mores Trail Mix
Ingredients:
- 2 c mini pretzels
- 1/2 c semisweet chocolate chips
- 1/2 c mini marshmallows
- large mixing bowl
- measuring cups and spoons
Instructions:
Have the girls line up. Each girl takes a turn adding one scoop of the ingredients to the bowl and then stirring before the next girl’s turn. When your mix is finished, use a measuring cup to scoop trail mix into individual baggies or paper cups for the girls to have.
While the girls were helping with snack, I passed an email sign up sheet around to the parents. I’m going to set up a Sign Up Genius form for snacks and helpers at each meeting, and I’ll send parents an email with information on uniform costs and other information they need.
After snack, we got to know each other a little better. Not all the kids are in the same class, so we played an ice breaker to make some new friends.
Animal Sounds Ice Breaker:
Print out the animal pairs sheet here and cut out each animal. Each girl should get an animal, and one other girl should have its match — so if you have 10 girls, you need 5 animal pairs. Have the girls pick their animal from a bowl or other container, without showing anyone which animal they got. They then circulate making only their animal noise until they find the other kid making the same animal noise. When they find their buddy, have them sit down together. The game continues until everyone is buddied up.
*If you have an odd number of girls, or a very large troop, print the sheet twice and have groups of three instead of two.
Once the girls are buddied up, have them get to know each other by asking:
- their buddy’s name
- how many siblings they have
- their favorite food
- their very favorite thing to do
If you have time, you can go around and ask each person to tell what they learned about their new friend.
After our ice breaker, we made nametags. I cut trefoil shapes out of cardstock using this template before the meeting and punched holes through the top. The girls wrote their names and decorated their nametags with stickers, markers, and crayons. We then threaded lanyard through the top so they can wear them. I made sure to collect our nametags at the end and I’ll hand them out before each meeting.
Then we looked at the Girl Scout Daisy uniform, and at all the petals we plan to earn this year. We talked about the different colors, and talked in simple terms about what each means. Here’s a breakdown:
- light blue — honest and fair
- yellow — friendly and helpful
- spring green — considerate and caring
- red — courageous and strong
- orange — responsible for what I say and do
- purple — respect myself and others
- magenta — respect authority
- green — use resources wisely
- rose — make the world a better place
- violet — be a sister to every Girl Scout
We followed that up with reciting the Girl Scout Promise, then forming a friendship circle. I made a few closing announcements, we sang “Make New Friends,” and we ended with the friendship squeeze.
And that was our first meeting! The girls seem pretty excited about the next one.
For more Girl Scout ideas, try one of these:
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- Creative Story Orbs
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- Magazine Beads
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- Fairy Gardens
I have been involved in Scouting for over 20 years. I haven’t been a leader since my 33 year-old earned her Gold Award as a senior in high school. My husband and I adopted two children and our 5 year-old can be a Daisy this fall. I jumped in and said I would lead. Your post gave me so many ideas for our first meeting. Thank you so much. It is nice to know that folks are still involved in Scouting. Scouting leaves so many memories for all involved. Thanks again!
Hi! I am so glad I came across this post! I am a first time leader of a Daisy troop I’m starting for my daughter and my has scouting changed since I did it *clears throat-cough-cough-clears throat* years ago… It’s so refreshing though to read how simple your ideas for a first meeting are – It really brought back the simplicity of scouting before the digital age of everything! I could picture doing these exact types of activities in one of my troop meetings – And the Make New Friends song and the Friendship Circle is so wonderful see stood the test of time!
Of course, now in the age of Covid, any suggestions for translating something like the Friendship Circle if I end up starting my troop with virtual meetings? I’m hoping NOT to have to do this (we are in an area with thankfully low case numbers), but will go with what the parents feel most comfortable with. Our council just okay’d in-person meetings again as of last week with certain criteria.
Thank you again for all the great ideas!
to end our in person friendship circle we stand at a distance in a circle. we then squat and do a “wave” first girl jumps up and raises both arms into the air. when the last girl jumps up we all shout our troop number…. we are still practicing this, lol for virtual we have done where everyone puts their hand in front of the camera at the end.
That’s a great idea for distance friendship circle – we have our 1st meeting Tuesday and we were trying to figure out what to do – thank you!
I’d love more girl scout daisy meeting patches ideas please
I’m so excited to have 8 Daisies join my troop of Ambassadors this year. The older girls are leading the younger ones and they have such fun ideas for the little ones to learn all about the Promise and the Law. We already have a full schedule for the rest of 2018 and are planning into 2019! Super exciting! I recommend you invite older girls to help. Daisies are a bit like herding cats, but they are super cute and fun – and so excited to be Girl Scouts. The older girls are so patient and such great examples. Plus the older ones get to earn a bunch of Leadership awards just by playing with the younger girls.
I am thinking of becoming a girl
Scout leader for my daughters Kindergarten troop. It looks like you have a lot of experience and would love to get more ideas from you.
Isn’t it great to lead the second time around! In my case I’m leading my granddaughter’s troop (my “2nd Gen” troop!) and the whole program is so different. My second granddaughter is starting this year and it’s even changed since my oldest granddaughter, a rising Junior, started 4 years ago! We just keep adding girls and now have Daisies – Brownies – Juniors. Challenging to program, but a lot of fun. Love your first meeting idea, can’t wait to see more!
Great article! How often do Daisy’s usually meet? Every week or every other week? Thank you!!
Loved this post! I’m a first time leader starting in Fall so I’m really looking for great ideas such as these to start my Troop! I’m excited to try them!
The trail mix activity is great and simple for the first meeting! Wonderful idea – thanks for sharing!
How long was this meeting?
one hour! I find Daisies can’t last much longer than that — especially if you’re meeting right after school. They get pretty fried!
What happened to the list of forms that was on here? I am a new leader and need to know which forms need to fill out, besides Program Release Forms. Thanks:)
hmm…I never had a list of forms on this post, but I did find that if you go to the main Girl Scout website, you can click on forms on the top right and find all of them! Usually, the girls need a health release form and a general permission slip form…
http://www.girlscoutsofcolorado.org/en/for-volunteers/forms-and-resources.html
I’m so glad to find your site. Thanks
Alyson