On Your Own

A special program developed for Brownie and Junior Girl Scouts who are "on their own" most days after school, evenings or weekends until a parent gets home from work.

On Your Own patches for Brownie and Junior Girl Scouts are available for purchase at the Council Shop.

To earn a patch: Juniors must complete starred requirements plus three more. Brownies may just complete the starred requirements marked "B."

1. * B Complete the American Red Cross "First Aid for Children Today" (FACT) self study course if you are a Brownie, or the First Aid Badge as described in the badgebook if you are a Junior.

2. * B Draw a floor plan of your house or apartment (all floors) showing escape routes in case of fire. Practice the routes to the outside through doorways with younger brothers and sisters and with friends who play with you.

3. * B Find out how to put out these small kitchen fires: the toaster has flames coming out from where the cord is attached to the toaster; hamburger grease is spilled on one of the stove burners and it runs down into the pan underneath and then catches fire; the pot holder isn't carefully put to one side of the stove and the corner of it touches the burner and starts on fire. (Be careful - this last one's tricky) Explain why there are different methods necessary for putting out fires.

4. * B Discuss with your patrol or group what to do if a stranger comes to the door or calls on the phone while you are home alone, and what to do if you are approached by a stranger outdoors.

5. * B Make a list of important phone numbers and post it by the phone in your home. If you have more than one phone, make a list to be posted near each phone. Include the police emergency and non-emergency numbers, the poison control center, fire department, parents' work numbers, close neighbors, doctors, and any other numbers you think are important. Practice making emergency phone calls to get help for someone injured, to report a fire, etc.

6. * B Plan simple dinner menus for your family for one week if you are a Brownie and for two weeks if you are a Junior. Decide with your parent or guardian on which days you will cook for everyone and find out if it's all right to use the appliances you will need to cook the food on your menus. If you are not allowed to use the stove, maybe you could use a different appliance, like an electric frying pan. If not, revise your menus so that they will contain meals you can prepare. Get involved in shopping for the food items you'll need. Prepare and cook your meals as planned, cleaning up as you go. Don't forget to set the table! Share your menus with your troop and report on how well each preparation went.

7. Learn to prepare four healthy snacks that need no cooking. (No sugar, no preservatives.) Take your recipes to your troop meeting and with your troopmates put together a "NO COOK BOOK". Give a copy of your troop's book to the library at the Girl Scout office.

8. * B Plan some appropriate activities for yourself and for the younger brothers and sisters for which you may be responsible and set them up ahead of time. Examples: Put together a craft kit with blunt scissors, paper, glue, crayons, cloth scraps, cardboard, yarn and other "around-the-house" craft items; make a library corner where a different book is featured each day; collect lots of little boxes of different sizes from which to create a city; put together a 3x5 file card box of game names - so you can reach in, draw out a card and play that game.

9. At the end of each week, make a day-by-day list of your activities for the upcoming week, including time each day for homework. Then make a "Kaper Chart" showing what household chores you will need to do each day. If you have brothers and sisters, work them into the chart to cover the other chores so that everyone carries a fair share. For instance, if you have a piano lesson Tuesday and Thursday at 6:45 P.M., you won't be able to wash dinner dishes those days, so see if your brother can. If your brother has early basketball practice on a couple of days and you are not occupied, you could do the early dog walks for him. Post the Kaper Chart where everyone at home can see it.

10. Adults often make "house rules" for after school time. If you have house rules, share them with your troop. Do you think your house rules are too strict? Too lenient? If you don't agree with the house rules, write a list you think is better - be sensible. Talk this list over with your troop and be prepared to explain why you have each rule on your list and why you dropped any of the old rules if you did. Next, talk your list over with your parents or guardians and see if they like it.

11. Choose a badge that you can do by yourself and work on it during a time you are on your own at home. Examples: Dabbler in Health and Fitness, Art-In-The-Round, Books, Music Lover, Pet Care, Exploring Healthy Eating.

12. * B Know what to do if you are locked out of your house.

13. Monitor your television watching habits during after school hours for one week. Add up how much time you watched each day. The next week, watch only half that much T.V. and fill the rest of the time with other things like reading, writing stories and letters, making crafts, woodwork or needlework items, weeding, cloud-watching, playing games, drawing. Finally, see how much you can do during a week when you watch no T.V.

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