Between Earth and Sky - Blue Bucket Award

It's Your Planet - Love It!: A Leadership Journey
Girl Scout Daisies

After successfully completing the ...3 Cheers for Animals! Journey nearly a month ago and taking a short break, Tessa and I were ready to hit the road once again this week. (Yeah, I'm behind on those last couple of ...3 Cheers posts. Hope to catch up soon!) Since there isn't enough time left in the year for me to facilitate another Journey for the entire troop, Tessa and I will complete the Between Earth and Sky Journey by ourselves at home.

I really struggled in deciding how to best implement Between Earth and Sky. I stayed very close to the outlined sessions for ...3 Cheers. I know that the Journeys haven't been well received, so their guidelines have been interpreted in all sorts of ways. I have great respect for Girl Scouts and appreciate what they're trying to do with the Journeys, so I really want to stay as true to the program as possible. Having said that, most of the suggested activities for Between Earth and Sky just aren't going to work for us. The science portion focuses primarily on plant science with a little earth science thrown in. The Journey also teaches basic kindergarten skills such as colors, textures, shapes and sorting. Almost every single activity in the book, Tessa and I have completed in some capacity during our homeschool studies these past couple of years. I'm pretty sure that most public school children have hit many of these topics as well. I really wish Girl Scouts would have stepped far outside of the box when designing the Journeys and chose science topics that foster higher-level learning.

When you really get down to it, the guidelines for earning the awards for Between Earth and Sky have nothing to do with science and everything to do with character and leadership education. Long story short, we will stay true to these guidelines for the awards and head in an entirely different direction for science and geography. While I haven't finalized all of our plans yet, I am designing them around the stories in the girls' book.

First story up was "Lupe's Powder-Blue Petal-Power Car" that tells all about Lupe's car...things we have long wondered about while earning the petals. One component of Lupe's car are sails made of leaves that let her car "fly down the highway" on windy days. I found some really awesome plans for a simple sail car via Pinterest. I loved this project because it touched on engineering, alternative energy and using resources wisely (we recycled milk bottle caps for the wheels). Tessa had a great time testing what types of "wind" best made her car go.

The activities Tessa completed to earn her Blue Bucket Award are outlined in Day 2 below. She had an absolute blast making the "Blue Bucket Bouquet." She set her flowers on a windowsill and continues to "water" them several times a day. (Yup, she's a rather silly girl.)

Between Earth and Sky - Blue Bucket Award

This first award encourages girls to become aware of their feelings and the feelings of those around them. It also encourages them to develop good relationship skills: for negotiating and compromising to resolve conflicts, and for being considerate and caring to others.

To earn award, the girls:

• tell one another about their feelings and the feelings of those around them.
• take part in role-playing activities that encourage them to resolve conflicts, negotiate, and be considerate to others.

Day 1

• Read “A Road Trip to Remember" (pages 4-5) and "Lupe's Powder-Blue Petal-Power Car" (pages 6-23) from Between Earth and Sky girls’ book. Completed associated questions and activities orally along the way.
• Built and tested "Simple Sail Car" by The Workshop for Young Engineers.

Tessa used recycled milk bottle caps for the wheels of her sail car. I pre-punched the holes ahead of time. 

To jazz up Tessa's sail car, I bought colored craft sticks for her to use. Not surprising, she went for the rainbow effect.

Tessa chose a bright pink sail for her car, of course.

Tessa experimented with different ways to make her sail car go. She tried blowing air through a straw, fanning it and simply taking big breaths and blowing.

Day 2

• Read Talk and Work It Out by Cheri J. Meiners M.Ed.
• Completed "Problem-Solving Games" (pages 33-35) from Talk and Work It Out by Cheri J. Meiners M.Ed. (We completed all of the games, which ran a bit long. Probably would need to pick-and-choose for a troop setting.)
• Crafted "Blue Bucket Bouquet" (designed with clip art from Graphics From the Pond) while identifying and discussing the various feelings Tessa and I had experienced throughout the day.

While pretending this jar was a person and the paper clips were ideas, Tessa and I talked about what we can do to listen with an open mind. This was just one of several problem-solving games we played from "Talk and Work It Out" by Cheri J. Meiners M.Ed.

Tessa and I identified and discussed the many different feelings we had experienced throughout the day. Afterward, she illustrated four of these feelings by crafting "Blue Bucket Bouquet." We used a blue paper cup for the bucket, matching blue cardstock cut to size for the handle, brads, hole punch, a floral foam block cut to size, green craft sticks, brown crinkle paper and general art supplies to complete the project.