A good icebreaker game in a Girl Scout meeting can do wonders to help your girls build friendships and gain confidence. Whether your girls are Daisies or teens, are meeting for the first time or ar…
Updated January 2022
Here's how you can host a fun indoor scavenger hunt during your next virtual meeting. This activity is for all levels of Girl Scouts.
A good icebreaker game in a Girl Scout meeting can do wonders to help your girls build friendships and gain confidence. Whether your girls are Daisies or teens, are meeting for the first time or ar…
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
We all know the best part of being in a troop or scouting is the hands-on delivery method that troop leaders employ to engage the girls in STEM activities–from building catapults to creating business plans to making slime, our girls are always elbows deep in something and all smiles because of it! Now that we have gone virtual with our troop meetings it’s important that we get creative to keep our girls engaged and STEM-focused. Today, we’ll be reviewing some tips for engaging your girls in a virtual engineering design challenge. I hope sometime soon we are back to meeting in person. When that happens this challenge will work for in person meetings as well. What is an engineering design challenge? An engineering design challenge is a challenge designed to get participants–in this case, your girls–to use the engineering design process as a means of delving into critical thinking. There are seven steps in the engineering design process: defining the problem, doing the background research, specifying requirements, brainstorming, developing a prototype, testing solutions, and communicating results. As you can see, this is quite the process. It’s more than fair to expect that you will need to truncate these, or remove certain steps, in order to make this more accessible for your girls. What kinds of engineering design challenges exist? There are a variety of strong engineering challenges that can be completed remotely, from an egg drop to creating a paper airplane launcher. Today, we’ll be discussing the steps to have your girls complete a remote aluminum foil boat. Step 1: Define the Problem In this challenge, students need to use a single sheet of tin foil to create the sturdiest boat they can create. The more weight the boat can hold while remaining afloat, the better! You will likely want to clarify to the girls that the boat must be self-supporting (no pool noodles underneath!). Additionally, we recommend clarifying upfront where the girls are allowed to test. Will they be floating their boat in a tupperware container? In the kitchen sink? In a bathtub? Ensure they know where to test and that proper supervision will be available depending on the age of the girls involved. Step 2: Research Next, you’ll want to research! Use this to develop their science knowledge. Consider sharing your screen and playing a video on the Archimedes Principle, the principle that governs why boats float. You can extend your discussion by talking about density. Ask your girls if they have ever been on a boat and have them share relevant experiences. What did they notice about the boat? Why do they think it remained afloat? Step 3: Specify Requirements This is where we complete that last-minute check for understanding. Let the girls know that they will be building with tin foil–that’s it. Let them know that the boat must float in water–taping it on top of a water bottle will not count. (Trust me folks, I’ve seen it all!) Step 4: Brainstorm Brainstorming is one of the most important steps in the engineering design process. This prevents your girls from immediately running amok to create their invention. At this time, clarify the expectations, ask each girl to grab a piece of paper and a pencil, mute the microphones, and ask your girls to spend ten minutes drawing their very best tin foil boat. Consider screen sharing a digital timer during this time. Particularly if you have girls with behavioral challenges or anxiety, knowing how much time they have left in a given activity can ensure that they remain stress-free and self-managed during this time. Refrain from offering feedback during this time–let your girls brainstorm their wildest ideas and test them later! The more they try and trip, the more they will learn to get back up again. Step 5: Develop a Prototype This is the moment your girls have been waiting for! Agree upon a time that they will come back together, or a signal that will get their attention, and set them loose! Remind them that they should be using their brainstorming drawings as blueprints for their prototypes. If they decide to make changes, they will need to add the changes to their drawings, in order to ensure they have their final model recorded. Step 6: Test This part can be a little tricky. Your girls will need to test their environment. If you have strong parent involvement, this is the part of the meeting where you text your parents and ask them to join you. They can support you by bringing a large bucket of water to the table (and moving their laptops far away!) Let your girls test their invention and slowly add weight. Remind them to write down their observations so that they will be prepared to share them with the team later on! Step 7: Communicate Results This is how you will close your meeting. Direct your girls to empty their water buckets, clean their area, and settle back down. Consider doing a moment of deep breathing to reinvest them in the task at hand. Go “around” your Zoom call and ask each girl to share their prototype and let the group know how they did. If time permits, consider giving them time to adjust their prototypes for future use. End by asking the girls to share “glows” and “grows,” that is, what did they do well during this project and what could they have done better? Virtual Troop Meetings Can Still be as Exciting as Ever Don’t be afraid to run virtual meetings! Your girls will be thrilled to see your face, as well as the face of their teammates. Feel free to offer yourself and your girls grace as you navigate this new roadblock. Additionally, remember–if you’re having fun, and the girls are learning, the mission has already been accomplished! I want to thank Kaitlin Anselmo for writing these ideas for all of you. She is a contributing author at STEM Toy Expert and has Girl Scouts experience, having led troops of underprivileged girls for three years. Her foremost experience is in education (K-10), where she loves trying out new STEM toys, activities and experiments with her students! Do you need more virtual meeting ideas? Check out these 50 Fun Games and Activities to Try at Your Virtual Troop Meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
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With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
In situations when you are not able to hold in-person scout meetings, like practicing social distancing, you can still hold scout meetings virtually!
20 FREE virtual escape rooms Harry Potter, Marvel, Star Wars, Fortnite, Minecraft, Pikachu, mermaid, educational digital escape rooms kids tweens, teens, adults.
Here are ideas for Thanksgiving crafts and game for in person and virtual Girl Scout meetings.
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
It is one of those years where no one thought we would have to discontinue in person meetings. Over the last couple weeks I have witnessed some amazing things that shows not only the creativity of our huge community of leaders, but even our girls. When across the country and even around the world we started seeing shut downs and closures. Everyone asked to social distance to save lives. What do our leaders and girl leaders of tomorrow do, they said, “How can I help? What can we do to continue learning and leading? How do we socialize remotely?” The challenge was given and around the world the ideas started pouring in. This post I want to share some of those ideas and suggestions to keep your troop active and engaged as a troop and in your communities. Troop Care Packages One great idea is to put together care packages to send home for your girls to do badges at home. If you decide to do virtual meetings (Check out advice for Zoom meetings below) you can give directions to parents to do parts of the activities before the virtual meeting. If you are just discontinuing meetings for now this is great for parents to do with girls at home. For example, Amanda Lee, a leader with Daisy and Brownie girls put together take home activities badge packs for her troop. These badge packs included 3 badge activities with projects, worksheets & crafts to earn badges at home along with a badge journal. She also included some extra things she purchased using cookie profit and added a box of cookies left over from sales as an extra treat! She used a few of the activity booklets from this website in her packet. For the Daisies she used the Petal Fairy Garden Adventure cut and paste book, Board game design challenge, and with her Brownies she used the Home Scientist. You can also checkout the Leader Connecting Leader shop for great resources for any age scout you may have. Virtual Meetings Using Zoom There are a number of ways you can have a virtual meeting. I have seen troops use Skype, Facebook, Facetime, Microsoft teams and the one I am going to discuss Zoom. It seems like Zoom has been the most popular for a number of organizations not just scouts. My sons Karate group uses it and has been a great way for him to keep being active with classes while being in our living room. Few Zoom Tips (you can use some of these with any technology you choose Just because we are at home we should still feel like we are going to meeting. Have your girls wear their uniform or whatever you require for meetings, vest, sash etc. Beyond just having video so everyone can see each other and you can see them, you can also share your screen. So you could show a Youtube Video, powerpoint or other presentation you have on your computer. There is a white board you can share which allows everyone to add comments and write things about a certain topic you are discussing. Reminds me of a poster board or white board you would have at a in person meeting. You will have ability to mute girls and not allow them to unmute themselves. So. you could then unmute and mute (one at a time or as a group) as you need. Zoom is free, you just have to keep your meeting under 40 minutes. I found that is plenty enough time for a meeting. If you needed more time you could start a new session. Cyber Security Idea If you are working on cyber security for any level scout many groups have taken a screenshot of their Zoom meeting and posted it on one of the private Scouting groups on Facebook. Here is a long list of ones you can join. When you post the image mention you are working on the badge and you want to show your girls how quickly something can travel on the web by having as many people as possible post a comment with their location. This way you are still keeping it pretty private into the scouting community while showing the girls how quickly something can travel. If you have 2nd or 3rd grade girls check out the Cyber Basics Printable Activity Booklet here on this site. Learn About The Stars Have your girls write a star story before your virtual meeting. Making up a story about a real or made up constellation. Set your meeting for right before sun goes down and moon and stars are coming out. So they could all watch together. Have girls take turns sharing their star stories. Share some amazing star constellations with your girls. Come up with some songs to sing together. Nasa is offering a pile of at home craft ideas you could also incorporate into this activity. Did you know you can have someone from the Kennedy Space Center read a book to girls? Here is a story being read “There is no place like space” Alphabet Challenge During Virtual Meeting During your virtual meeting have everyone write A – Z straight down on paper. Then give each girl a set time to write something down for each letter of the alphabet based on a topic such as countries, animals, kitchen items etc. Then starting with first letter everyone shares their answer. Girls discussed which answers are good and counted. Let the girls judge. 2 points for each unique answer 1 point if someone else had the same answer 0 points if no answer or invalid answer At end of meeting as an activity girls can do with their parents is use the A – Z scavenger hunt Activity booklet. Which allows them to get outside and find things that start with each letter, or if to cold do it in the house! Using Zoom and Girls Creativity to Plan Are you struggling to come up with fun ideas to do virtually? Leave it to your girls. If you are using zoom then use the whiteboard function on zoom. You can stop sharing and turn on and then let the girls write down ideas for what they want to do at online troop meetings. Then once the brainstorm is complete vote on what the girls want to do at their next meeting. Be sure to save the white board to refer back to later. Group Service Project Ideas Even if you are not together, why not learn a new skill. Even a better time to make something and donate to people who need it. Examples such as learn how to knit, make scarves for homeless. Learn how to sew and make masks for first responders. Making fleece and no sew beds for animal shelters, which can be connected to pet activities for 2nd and 3rd grade girls. Meet a Author, Read, and Earn a Fun patch I have talked about Rachel Alpine who is the author of 2 great books: YOU THROW LIKE A GIRL, the book is full of girl power and a message about being yourself. It was a Junior Library Guild selected book and is perfect for kids in grades 2-6 and is 100% kid friendly (so you can read it together with your family!) Read more FRIDAY NIGHT STAGE LIGHTS is about a girl who loves ballet but moves to a town that loves football and what happens when the two worlds collide. It’s full of girl power and messages about trying new things and believing in yourself. It’s great for girls in grades 3-8. Read more She is still offering patch programs for both of her two books, which is a great way to keep your troop connected while not in school. And as a bonus, she is doing a live web stream for each book where the girls can tune in and submit questions that she will answer in real time. Be sure to contact her to learn more about free private Zoom chats with your troop and/or discounted bulk rates for 25 or more books. [email protected] Meet another author, Micheal Anderson, who is also offering meet and greet zoom sessions. If leaders are interested, they can contact her at [email protected] and write “Im Interested” in the subject line of the email along with their troop number. Zoey Lyndon’s Big Move to the Lou is an inspiring book about a 4th grade science loving girl who desperately wants to fit in at her new school. She struggles initially, but her love of science is what ultimately ends up breaking the ice for her and she learns to navigate the fourth grade like a pro. This is a fun, fast paced story that encourages girls to pursue STEM. Fun patches With Virtual Meetings In Mind They are popping up everywhere. Funny patches, patches around virtual meetings, patches around Covid-19 you name it. Here are my top 3 favorites that have been circling around. TOGETHER WE STAND ACTIVE, INFORMED, CONNECTED AND PREPARED TO FIGHT COVID19 Fun patch – pick between a patch that you can color in the bracelets using markers or ones that are already colored. It is pretty cool! Your first Zoom meeting? Of course you want to remember that with a fun patch. ZOOM MEETING FUN PATCH Virtual meeting using any platform. This is really a cute fun patch. ViRTUAL MEETING FUN PATCH Let Your Council Help I have seen it all over Facebook, many councils are offering virtual programs to earn badges. They are using virtual systems like Facebook Live, Zoom, Skype programs. If you have not seen any of these on Facebook, checkout your council’s website. Many councils have opened it up to girls all over the USA so be sure to go to Facebook and search for girl scouts! Digital Tools For Your Troop The likelihood is you won’t always be running virtual meetings, and at some point you’ll be returning to a meeting setting. Technology can support us in many different ways, whether we are communicating virtually, or in person. For example, wireless screen mirroring in classrooms is a fantastic tool to use for presentations, or sharing information. When you use tech tools like this at your meetings, you’ll benefit from improved teamwork, interaction and active learning. It could be a great way to introduce ways to allow for girls unable to attend a meeting due to illness or other transportation issues to join a meeting virtually while others are in person. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
20 FREE virtual escape rooms Harry Potter, Marvel, Star Wars, Fortnite, Minecraft, Pikachu, mermaid, educational digital escape rooms kids tweens, teens, adults.
Submitted by Tracy Nelson Tracy Nelson shares what her Troop 30689, a first grade Girl Scout Daisy troop in New Jersey did to help their community. The troop consists of a fantastic group of 11 Kindergarteners who were more than willing to participate and help the community. We gave the girls a list of service …
It is one of those years where no one thought we would have to discontinue in person meetings. Over the last couple weeks I have witnessed some amazing things that shows not only the creativity of our huge community of leaders, but even our girls. When across the country and even around the world we started seeing shut downs and closures. Everyone asked to social distance to save lives. What do our leaders and girl leaders of tomorrow do, they said, “How can I help? What can we do to continue learning and leading? How do we socialize remotely?” The challenge was given and around the world the ideas started pouring in. This post I want to share some of those ideas and suggestions to keep your troop active and engaged as a troop and in your communities. Troop Care Packages One great idea is to put together care packages to send home for your girls to do badges at home. If you decide to do virtual meetings (Check out advice for Zoom meetings below) you can give directions to parents to do parts of the activities before the virtual meeting. If you are just discontinuing meetings for now this is great for parents to do with girls at home. For example, Amanda Lee, a leader with Daisy and Brownie girls put together take home activities badge packs for her troop. These badge packs included 3 badge activities with projects, worksheets & crafts to earn badges at home along with a badge journal. She also included some extra things she purchased using cookie profit and added a box of cookies left over from sales as an extra treat! She used a few of the activity booklets from this website in her packet. For the Daisies she used the Petal Fairy Garden Adventure cut and paste book, Board game design challenge, and with her Brownies she used the Home Scientist. You can also checkout the Leader Connecting Leader shop for great resources for any age scout you may have. Virtual Meetings Using Zoom There are a number of ways you can have a virtual meeting. I have seen troops use Skype, Facebook, Facetime, Microsoft teams and the one I am going to discuss Zoom. It seems like Zoom has been the most popular for a number of organizations not just scouts. My sons Karate group uses it and has been a great way for him to keep being active with classes while being in our living room. Few Zoom Tips (you can use some of these with any technology you choose Just because we are at home we should still feel like we are going to meeting. Have your girls wear their uniform or whatever you require for meetings, vest, sash etc. Beyond just having video so everyone can see each other and you can see them, you can also share your screen. So you could show a Youtube Video, powerpoint or other presentation you have on your computer. There is a white board you can share which allows everyone to add comments and write things about a certain topic you are discussing. Reminds me of a poster board or white board you would have at a in person meeting. You will have ability to mute girls and not allow them to unmute themselves. So. you could then unmute and mute (one at a time or as a group) as you need. Zoom is free, you just have to keep your meeting under 40 minutes. I found that is plenty enough time for a meeting. If you needed more time you could start a new session. Cyber Security Idea If you are working on cyber security for any level scout many groups have taken a screenshot of their Zoom meeting and posted it on one of the private Scouting groups on Facebook. Here is a long list of ones you can join. When you post the image mention you are working on the badge and you want to show your girls how quickly something can travel on the web by having as many people as possible post a comment with their location. This way you are still keeping it pretty private into the scouting community while showing the girls how quickly something can travel. If you have 2nd or 3rd grade girls check out the Cyber Basics Printable Activity Booklet here on this site. Learn About The Stars Have your girls write a star story before your virtual meeting. Making up a story about a real or made up constellation. Set your meeting for right before sun goes down and moon and stars are coming out. So they could all watch together. Have girls take turns sharing their star stories. Share some amazing star constellations with your girls. Come up with some songs to sing together. Nasa is offering a pile of at home craft ideas you could also incorporate into this activity. Did you know you can have someone from the Kennedy Space Center read a book to girls? Here is a story being read “There is no place like space” Alphabet Challenge During Virtual Meeting During your virtual meeting have everyone write A – Z straight down on paper. Then give each girl a set time to write something down for each letter of the alphabet based on a topic such as countries, animals, kitchen items etc. Then starting with first letter everyone shares their answer. Girls discussed which answers are good and counted. Let the girls judge. 2 points for each unique answer 1 point if someone else had the same answer 0 points if no answer or invalid answer At end of meeting as an activity girls can do with their parents is use the A – Z scavenger hunt Activity booklet. Which allows them to get outside and find things that start with each letter, or if to cold do it in the house! Using Zoom and Girls Creativity to Plan Are you struggling to come up with fun ideas to do virtually? Leave it to your girls. If you are using zoom then use the whiteboard function on zoom. You can stop sharing and turn on and then let the girls write down ideas for what they want to do at online troop meetings. Then once the brainstorm is complete vote on what the girls want to do at their next meeting. Be sure to save the white board to refer back to later. Group Service Project Ideas Even if you are not together, why not learn a new skill. Even a better time to make something and donate to people who need it. Examples such as learn how to knit, make scarves for homeless. Learn how to sew and make masks for first responders. Making fleece and no sew beds for animal shelters, which can be connected to pet activities for 2nd and 3rd grade girls. Meet a Author, Read, and Earn a Fun patch I have talked about Rachel Alpine who is the author of 2 great books: YOU THROW LIKE A GIRL, the book is full of girl power and a message about being yourself. It was a Junior Library Guild selected book and is perfect for kids in grades 2-6 and is 100% kid friendly (so you can read it together with your family!) Read more FRIDAY NIGHT STAGE LIGHTS is about a girl who loves ballet but moves to a town that loves football and what happens when the two worlds collide. It’s full of girl power and messages about trying new things and believing in yourself. It’s great for girls in grades 3-8. Read more She is still offering patch programs for both of her two books, which is a great way to keep your troop connected while not in school. And as a bonus, she is doing a live web stream for each book where the girls can tune in and submit questions that she will answer in real time. Be sure to contact her to learn more about free private Zoom chats with your troop and/or discounted bulk rates for 25 or more books. [email protected] Meet another author, Micheal Anderson, who is also offering meet and greet zoom sessions. If leaders are interested, they can contact her at [email protected] and write “Im Interested” in the subject line of the email along with their troop number. Zoey Lyndon’s Big Move to the Lou is an inspiring book about a 4th grade science loving girl who desperately wants to fit in at her new school. She struggles initially, but her love of science is what ultimately ends up breaking the ice for her and she learns to navigate the fourth grade like a pro. This is a fun, fast paced story that encourages girls to pursue STEM. Fun patches With Virtual Meetings In Mind They are popping up everywhere. Funny patches, patches around virtual meetings, patches around Covid-19 you name it. Here are my top 3 favorites that have been circling around. TOGETHER WE STAND ACTIVE, INFORMED, CONNECTED AND PREPARED TO FIGHT COVID19 Fun patch – pick between a patch that you can color in the bracelets using markers or ones that are already colored. It is pretty cool! Your first Zoom meeting? Of course you want to remember that with a fun patch. ZOOM MEETING FUN PATCH Virtual meeting using any platform. This is really a cute fun patch. ViRTUAL MEETING FUN PATCH Let Your Council Help I have seen it all over Facebook, many councils are offering virtual programs to earn badges. They are using virtual systems like Facebook Live, Zoom, Skype programs. If you have not seen any of these on Facebook, checkout your council’s website. Many councils have opened it up to girls all over the USA so be sure to go to Facebook and search for girl scouts! Digital Tools For Your Troop The likelihood is you won’t always be running virtual meetings, and at some point you’ll be returning to a meeting setting. Technology can support us in many different ways, whether we are communicating virtually, or in person. For example, wireless screen mirroring in classrooms is a fantastic tool to use for presentations, or sharing information. When you use tech tools like this at your meetings, you’ll benefit from improved teamwork, interaction and active learning. It could be a great way to introduce ways to allow for girls unable to attend a meeting due to illness or other transportation issues to join a meeting virtually while others are in person. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
As we take necessary precautions to ensure the safety and well-being of everyone in our communities, we can still try to maintain some semblance of everyday life for our Girl…Read On!Apart, But Together: Staying Virtually Connected with Your Troop
It happens to all of us.
This easy virtual Girl Scout community service project is perfect for earnng the light green Daisy petal, Considerate and Caring. Older troop can also participate.
Find out 10 fun and easy to do virtual winter crafts and activities for your December Girl Scout Meeting. These can be used in January and February as well.
It's almost cookie season, which means it's back to Girl Scout Troop Meetings, and organizing each meeting is sometimes a task. Having a printable template to write on ahead of time, will make it that much easier. Whether you are a volunteer or Troop Leader, having your meeting agenda laid out will give you more time to focus on your Girl Scouts! 1 FILE INCLUDED FOR INSTANT DOWNLOAD - File 1 will be the PDF to write on SECTIONS HIGHLIGHTED - Meeting Date - Time - Activity or Badge being worked on - Person bringing snack - Today's Activities - Reminders - New Business - Next Meeting - At Home SIZING - Letter Size (8.5"x11") PLEASE NOTE - Colors may vary when printed due to printer and monitor calibrations. Monitors will all display colors differently and printers will all print differently as well. Colors can also display differently on phones/tablets as opposed to computer monitors. Please be sure to print your file from a computer monitor instead of a phone as phones will reduce the image quality. HOW TO DOWNLOAD - Log into your Etsy account using a WEB BROWSER (the Etsy mobile app will NOT support downloading) - Click the "You" tab. - Scroll and click "Purchases and Reviews". - Find your purchase and click "Download Files". - Click "Download" - Once downloaded, you may print or upload to your preferred app for digital use REFUNDS - Due to the fact that it is a digital download, there are no refunds. However, if you have any issues with your purchase please contact me. FOR NONCOMMERCIAL USE ONLY Downloads from Pretty Pineapple Paper are for personal use only. By purchasing this item you agree and are bound by the copyright agreement.
“Argh!” is a familiar soundtrack at our house these days. It’s the internet glitching and kicking us out of our Google Meets and Zoom calls. Or it’s trying to cultivate…Read On!How to Help Girls Manage Frustration
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
It is one of those years where no one thought we would have to discontinue in person meetings. Over the last couple weeks I have witnessed some amazing things that shows not only the creativity of our huge community of leaders, but even our girls. When across the country and even around the world we started seeing shut downs and closures. Everyone asked to social distance to save lives. What do our leaders and girl leaders of tomorrow do, they said, “How can I help? What can we do to continue learning and leading? How do we socialize remotely?” The challenge was given and around the world the ideas started pouring in. This post I want to share some of those ideas and suggestions to keep your troop active and engaged as a troop and in your communities. Troop Care Packages One great idea is to put together care packages to send home for your girls to do badges at home. If you decide to do virtual meetings (Check out advice for Zoom meetings below) you can give directions to parents to do parts of the activities before the virtual meeting. If you are just discontinuing meetings for now this is great for parents to do with girls at home. For example, Amanda Lee, a leader with Daisy and Brownie girls put together take home activities badge packs for her troop. These badge packs included 3 badge activities with projects, worksheets & crafts to earn badges at home along with a badge journal. She also included some extra things she purchased using cookie profit and added a box of cookies left over from sales as an extra treat! She used a few of the activity booklets from this website in her packet. For the Daisies she used the Petal Fairy Garden Adventure cut and paste book, Board game design challenge, and with her Brownies she used the Home Scientist. You can also checkout the Leader Connecting Leader shop for great resources for any age scout you may have. Virtual Meetings Using Zoom There are a number of ways you can have a virtual meeting. I have seen troops use Skype, Facebook, Facetime, Microsoft teams and the one I am going to discuss Zoom. It seems like Zoom has been the most popular for a number of organizations not just scouts. My sons Karate group uses it and has been a great way for him to keep being active with classes while being in our living room. Few Zoom Tips (you can use some of these with any technology you choose Just because we are at home we should still feel like we are going to meeting. Have your girls wear their uniform or whatever you require for meetings, vest, sash etc. Beyond just having video so everyone can see each other and you can see them, you can also share your screen. So you could show a Youtube Video, powerpoint or other presentation you have on your computer. There is a white board you can share which allows everyone to add comments and write things about a certain topic you are discussing. Reminds me of a poster board or white board you would have at a in person meeting. You will have ability to mute girls and not allow them to unmute themselves. So. you could then unmute and mute (one at a time or as a group) as you need. Zoom is free, you just have to keep your meeting under 40 minutes. I found that is plenty enough time for a meeting. If you needed more time you could start a new session. Cyber Security Idea If you are working on cyber security for any level scout many groups have taken a screenshot of their Zoom meeting and posted it on one of the private Scouting groups on Facebook. Here is a long list of ones you can join. When you post the image mention you are working on the badge and you want to show your girls how quickly something can travel on the web by having as many people as possible post a comment with their location. This way you are still keeping it pretty private into the scouting community while showing the girls how quickly something can travel. If you have 2nd or 3rd grade girls check out the Cyber Basics Printable Activity Booklet here on this site. Learn About The Stars Have your girls write a star story before your virtual meeting. Making up a story about a real or made up constellation. Set your meeting for right before sun goes down and moon and stars are coming out. So they could all watch together. Have girls take turns sharing their star stories. Share some amazing star constellations with your girls. Come up with some songs to sing together. Nasa is offering a pile of at home craft ideas you could also incorporate into this activity. Did you know you can have someone from the Kennedy Space Center read a book to girls? Here is a story being read “There is no place like space” Alphabet Challenge During Virtual Meeting During your virtual meeting have everyone write A – Z straight down on paper. Then give each girl a set time to write something down for each letter of the alphabet based on a topic such as countries, animals, kitchen items etc. Then starting with first letter everyone shares their answer. Girls discussed which answers are good and counted. Let the girls judge. 2 points for each unique answer 1 point if someone else had the same answer 0 points if no answer or invalid answer At end of meeting as an activity girls can do with their parents is use the A – Z scavenger hunt Activity booklet. Which allows them to get outside and find things that start with each letter, or if to cold do it in the house! Using Zoom and Girls Creativity to Plan Are you struggling to come up with fun ideas to do virtually? Leave it to your girls. If you are using zoom then use the whiteboard function on zoom. You can stop sharing and turn on and then let the girls write down ideas for what they want to do at online troop meetings. Then once the brainstorm is complete vote on what the girls want to do at their next meeting. Be sure to save the white board to refer back to later. Group Service Project Ideas Even if you are not together, why not learn a new skill. Even a better time to make something and donate to people who need it. Examples such as learn how to knit, make scarves for homeless. Learn how to sew and make masks for first responders. Making fleece and no sew beds for animal shelters, which can be connected to pet activities for 2nd and 3rd grade girls. Meet a Author, Read, and Earn a Fun patch I have talked about Rachel Alpine who is the author of 2 great books: YOU THROW LIKE A GIRL, the book is full of girl power and a message about being yourself. It was a Junior Library Guild selected book and is perfect for kids in grades 2-6 and is 100% kid friendly (so you can read it together with your family!) Read more FRIDAY NIGHT STAGE LIGHTS is about a girl who loves ballet but moves to a town that loves football and what happens when the two worlds collide. It’s full of girl power and messages about trying new things and believing in yourself. It’s great for girls in grades 3-8. Read more She is still offering patch programs for both of her two books, which is a great way to keep your troop connected while not in school. And as a bonus, she is doing a live web stream for each book where the girls can tune in and submit questions that she will answer in real time. Be sure to contact her to learn more about free private Zoom chats with your troop and/or discounted bulk rates for 25 or more books. [email protected] Meet another author, Micheal Anderson, who is also offering meet and greet zoom sessions. If leaders are interested, they can contact her at [email protected] and write “Im Interested” in the subject line of the email along with their troop number. Zoey Lyndon’s Big Move to the Lou is an inspiring book about a 4th grade science loving girl who desperately wants to fit in at her new school. She struggles initially, but her love of science is what ultimately ends up breaking the ice for her and she learns to navigate the fourth grade like a pro. This is a fun, fast paced story that encourages girls to pursue STEM. Fun patches With Virtual Meetings In Mind They are popping up everywhere. Funny patches, patches around virtual meetings, patches around Covid-19 you name it. Here are my top 3 favorites that have been circling around. TOGETHER WE STAND ACTIVE, INFORMED, CONNECTED AND PREPARED TO FIGHT COVID19 Fun patch – pick between a patch that you can color in the bracelets using markers or ones that are already colored. It is pretty cool! Your first Zoom meeting? Of course you want to remember that with a fun patch. ZOOM MEETING FUN PATCH Virtual meeting using any platform. This is really a cute fun patch. ViRTUAL MEETING FUN PATCH Let Your Council Help I have seen it all over Facebook, many councils are offering virtual programs to earn badges. They are using virtual systems like Facebook Live, Zoom, Skype programs. If you have not seen any of these on Facebook, checkout your council’s website. Many councils have opened it up to girls all over the USA so be sure to go to Facebook and search for girl scouts! Digital Tools For Your Troop The likelihood is you won’t always be running virtual meetings, and at some point you’ll be returning to a meeting setting. Technology can support us in many different ways, whether we are communicating virtually, or in person. For example, wireless screen mirroring in classrooms is a fantastic tool to use for presentations, or sharing information. When you use tech tools like this at your meetings, you’ll benefit from improved teamwork, interaction and active learning. It could be a great way to introduce ways to allow for girls unable to attend a meeting due to illness or other transportation issues to join a meeting virtually while others are in person. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
It is one of those years where no one thought we would have to discontinue in person meetings. Over the last couple weeks I have witnessed some amazing things that shows not only the creativity of our huge community of leaders, but even our girls. When across the country and even around the world we started seeing shut downs and closures. Everyone asked to social distance to save lives. What do our leaders and girl leaders of tomorrow do, they said, “How can I help? What can we do to continue learning and leading? How do we socialize remotely?” The challenge was given and around the world the ideas started pouring in. This post I want to share some of those ideas and suggestions to keep your troop active and engaged as a troop and in your communities. Troop Care Packages One great idea is to put together care packages to send home for your girls to do badges at home. If you decide to do virtual meetings (Check out advice for Zoom meetings below) you can give directions to parents to do parts of the activities before the virtual meeting. If you are just discontinuing meetings for now this is great for parents to do with girls at home. For example, Amanda Lee, a leader with Daisy and Brownie girls put together take home activities badge packs for her troop. These badge packs included 3 badge activities with projects, worksheets & crafts to earn badges at home along with a badge journal. She also included some extra things she purchased using cookie profit and added a box of cookies left over from sales as an extra treat! She used a few of the activity booklets from this website in her packet. For the Daisies she used the Petal Fairy Garden Adventure cut and paste book, Board game design challenge, and with her Brownies she used the Home Scientist. You can also checkout the Leader Connecting Leader shop for great resources for any age scout you may have. Virtual Meetings Using Zoom There are a number of ways you can have a virtual meeting. I have seen troops use Skype, Facebook, Facetime, Microsoft teams and the one I am going to discuss Zoom. It seems like Zoom has been the most popular for a number of organizations not just scouts. My sons Karate group uses it and has been a great way for him to keep being active with classes while being in our living room. Few Zoom Tips (you can use some of these with any technology you choose Just because we are at home we should still feel like we are going to meeting. Have your girls wear their uniform or whatever you require for meetings, vest, sash etc. Beyond just having video so everyone can see each other and you can see them, you can also share your screen. So you could show a Youtube Video, powerpoint or other presentation you have on your computer. There is a white board you can share which allows everyone to add comments and write things about a certain topic you are discussing. Reminds me of a poster board or white board you would have at a in person meeting. You will have ability to mute girls and not allow them to unmute themselves. So. you could then unmute and mute (one at a time or as a group) as you need. Zoom is free, you just have to keep your meeting under 40 minutes. I found that is plenty enough time for a meeting. If you needed more time you could start a new session. Cyber Security Idea If you are working on cyber security for any level scout many groups have taken a screenshot of their Zoom meeting and posted it on one of the private Scouting groups on Facebook. Here is a long list of ones you can join. When you post the image mention you are working on the badge and you want to show your girls how quickly something can travel on the web by having as many people as possible post a comment with their location. This way you are still keeping it pretty private into the scouting community while showing the girls how quickly something can travel. If you have 2nd or 3rd grade girls check out the Cyber Basics Printable Activity Booklet here on this site. Learn About The Stars Have your girls write a star story before your virtual meeting. Making up a story about a real or made up constellation. Set your meeting for right before sun goes down and moon and stars are coming out. So they could all watch together. Have girls take turns sharing their star stories. Share some amazing star constellations with your girls. Come up with some songs to sing together. Nasa is offering a pile of at home craft ideas you could also incorporate into this activity. Did you know you can have someone from the Kennedy Space Center read a book to girls? Here is a story being read “There is no place like space” Alphabet Challenge During Virtual Meeting During your virtual meeting have everyone write A – Z straight down on paper. Then give each girl a set time to write something down for each letter of the alphabet based on a topic such as countries, animals, kitchen items etc. Then starting with first letter everyone shares their answer. Girls discussed which answers are good and counted. Let the girls judge. 2 points for each unique answer 1 point if someone else had the same answer 0 points if no answer or invalid answer At end of meeting as an activity girls can do with their parents is use the A – Z scavenger hunt Activity booklet. Which allows them to get outside and find things that start with each letter, or if to cold do it in the house! Using Zoom and Girls Creativity to Plan Are you struggling to come up with fun ideas to do virtually? Leave it to your girls. If you are using zoom then use the whiteboard function on zoom. You can stop sharing and turn on and then let the girls write down ideas for what they want to do at online troop meetings. Then once the brainstorm is complete vote on what the girls want to do at their next meeting. Be sure to save the white board to refer back to later. Group Service Project Ideas Even if you are not together, why not learn a new skill. Even a better time to make something and donate to people who need it. Examples such as learn how to knit, make scarves for homeless. Learn how to sew and make masks for first responders. Making fleece and no sew beds for animal shelters, which can be connected to pet activities for 2nd and 3rd grade girls. Meet a Author, Read, and Earn a Fun patch I have talked about Rachel Alpine who is the author of 2 great books: YOU THROW LIKE A GIRL, the book is full of girl power and a message about being yourself. It was a Junior Library Guild selected book and is perfect for kids in grades 2-6 and is 100% kid friendly (so you can read it together with your family!) Read more FRIDAY NIGHT STAGE LIGHTS is about a girl who loves ballet but moves to a town that loves football and what happens when the two worlds collide. It’s full of girl power and messages about trying new things and believing in yourself. It’s great for girls in grades 3-8. Read more She is still offering patch programs for both of her two books, which is a great way to keep your troop connected while not in school. And as a bonus, she is doing a live web stream for each book where the girls can tune in and submit questions that she will answer in real time. Be sure to contact her to learn more about free private Zoom chats with your troop and/or discounted bulk rates for 25 or more books. [email protected] Meet another author, Micheal Anderson, who is also offering meet and greet zoom sessions. If leaders are interested, they can contact her at [email protected] and write “Im Interested” in the subject line of the email along with their troop number. Zoey Lyndon’s Big Move to the Lou is an inspiring book about a 4th grade science loving girl who desperately wants to fit in at her new school. She struggles initially, but her love of science is what ultimately ends up breaking the ice for her and she learns to navigate the fourth grade like a pro. This is a fun, fast paced story that encourages girls to pursue STEM. Fun patches With Virtual Meetings In Mind They are popping up everywhere. Funny patches, patches around virtual meetings, patches around Covid-19 you name it. Here are my top 3 favorites that have been circling around. TOGETHER WE STAND ACTIVE, INFORMED, CONNECTED AND PREPARED TO FIGHT COVID19 Fun patch – pick between a patch that you can color in the bracelets using markers or ones that are already colored. It is pretty cool! Your first Zoom meeting? Of course you want to remember that with a fun patch. ZOOM MEETING FUN PATCH Virtual meeting using any platform. This is really a cute fun patch. ViRTUAL MEETING FUN PATCH Let Your Council Help I have seen it all over Facebook, many councils are offering virtual programs to earn badges. They are using virtual systems like Facebook Live, Zoom, Skype programs. If you have not seen any of these on Facebook, checkout your council’s website. Many councils have opened it up to girls all over the USA so be sure to go to Facebook and search for girl scouts! Digital Tools For Your Troop The likelihood is you won’t always be running virtual meetings, and at some point you’ll be returning to a meeting setting. Technology can support us in many different ways, whether we are communicating virtually, or in person. For example, wireless screen mirroring in classrooms is a fantastic tool to use for presentations, or sharing information. When you use tech tools like this at your meetings, you’ll benefit from improved teamwork, interaction and active learning. It could be a great way to introduce ways to allow for girls unable to attend a meeting due to illness or other transportation issues to join a meeting virtually while others are in person. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
Inspiring girl leaders of tomorrow
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
On March 25, from Christian VIII’s Palace at Amalienborg, Princess Benedikte participated in two virtual meetings with first The Olave Baden...
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
Here's how you can host a fun indoor scavenger hunt during your next virtual meeting. This activity is for all levels of Girl Scouts.
Here are 10 Fun and Easy Girl Scout End of the Year Ideas for your troop and troop families.
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!
Updated January 2022
With the world going virtual it can be challenging sometimes to continue to be creative and keep your meetings fun while you are all in different places. Over the last few months I have seen many creative leaders come up with ideas and have tried some of my own while trying to keep my kids active with family and friends. Today I want to share 50 that I hope you can use at one of your next meetings. Make Virtual Memories with these 50 Fun Ideas Card Games Card games have been a source of fun and cherished memories for centuries, and now, online versions offer the same level of entertainment. Two particularly popular card games worth exploring are Hearts and Spades. With Hearts, players strive to avoid certain cards carrying penalty points, aiming to finish with the fewest points by the game’s end. In Spades, players form partnerships and bid on the number of tricks they anticipate winning, with spades as the trump suit. The goal is to meet or exceed their bid successfully. Both these games can be played with a deck of cards, or online on sites like hearts.land or spades.co. Sing a song as a group One of my favorites “Make New Friends” Do you need the lyrics? Get them here.I know sometimes the sound will be off – sounding like a horrible round. But you know what the girls will have fun doing it either way! Show and Tell Let the group pick the subject. Examples: show their bedroom or favorite stuffed animal and walk around house showing off something to group. Of course make sure they watch where they are walking and have permission from their parents to move device they are using. Play Pictionary If you are meeting with Zoom using the whiteboard feature.How to play: Put everyone on call into two teams. To play, divide your group into teams. Choose the team to go first and either have one girl on team come up with a word for her team to guess or use this easy to use Pictionary word generator. Then give the drawer one minute to draw that word for their team to guess. If the team guesses the card correctly, they get a point. Choose how long you will play or to what point level to find a winner. Virtual Zoo Field Trip You may not be able to go to the zoo but many zoos offer live footage of their zoo animals. Take your girls on a zoo trip virtually. Here are a few to get you started. If you have a local zoo be sure to check in locally as well.– Baboons at San Diego Zoo– Elephant at Houston Zoo Paint a Kindness Rock Girls will enjoy painting a rock and leaving somewhere on their next work for someone else to find. I shared my experience with the Kindness Rock Project a few years ago. This is the perfect time to keep these gestures going. Making masks for people in your community One thing many people need right now is masks, there are many making them and selling but you could also make them and donate to people in your community. Make a “Thinking of You” card Make for people in nursing homes, senior residences, and assisted living. The card can be anything the girls want to put on them. Learn how to make a Kite “Thinking of You” card. Slime making This is a great activity you could do together as group. Make sure everyone has the supplies needed to make before hand. Or ask each girl to find a recipe for slime online and make it before meeting. Then each girl could take turns sharing how they made it, and the science behind the slime. Here is an article to get you started, there are so many recipes for slime the girls will have a blast learning about a new one. Bingo Game You can play a bingo game about any topic or theme. I have put together a number of game packs with Bingo, a card game, and 4 corner game. You can send the file to each girl or drop them off. To get you started Birthday Bingo + 2 other games Juliette Low Bingo – Join my mailing list and get it for free Halloween Bingo + 2 other games Fall Bingo + 2 other games Patriotic Bingo + 2 other games Country bingo – browse bingo games for different countries Thanksgiving Bingo + 2 other games Christmas Bingo + 2 other games Do you need a specific bingo game made and can’t find it? email me and I can custom make the game for you. Trivia Night You choose the topic. If you wanted to teach your girls more about Scouting ask questions around that, maybe everyone just watched a new movie, do trivia on that topic. If you just want to do trivia for kids check out this list – everything you need for a fun trivia night. Household Scavenger hunt You can do this individually or if you have a large group – use the zoom meeting breakout rooms where girls can work together to gather the 10 things, then come back to main room to share what they found. Here is a list to get you started. Kahoot Games There are a number of quizzes set up related to Girl Scouts you could try, set up a free account for up to 10 girls and create your own games as well. This could be a great way to have different girls lead the meeting if they wanted to create trivia to run at next meeting. learn more Scattergories This is an easy game to play over a zoom meeting. I found a site that makes it even easier just share your screen and play. Move to the next round by clicking “restart.” Here is the easy to use online version.Forget the rules? Here are the directions from the board game version, which can translated to online version above. Cake decorating Before meeting tell girls to bake a cake or cupcakes and then as a group decorate their cakes. If you are able to get supplies and drop off to each girl before meeting do that. Well everyone is decorating chat. When done share designs with each other. Talent show Give each girl about 3 to 5 minutes to share. Plan ahead at previous meeting so you know how many girls plan to participate. Ideas: Singing, instruments, karate, dance, showcasing drawing talents or if their talents are more outside like Basketball or fishing have them video tape to show at meeting. Freeze Dance or other movement dance What girls don’t like to dance? add one of these active youtube videos to your next virtual meeting. It might be a great way to end the meeting or even break it up in middle of meeting. The Dance Freeze Song Tooty Ta World Tour using Skycams Since travel is not an option right now, it doesn’t have to stop us from dreaming right? Pick some places the girls wish they could visit and take them there live using Skycams. There are a variety of live cameras all over the world to view. Summer Bucket List Print a copy of this summer time bucket list you can have the girls do the things and record and share at a virtual meeting the things they did from list. Virtual Coding Workshops – **Update: July 21, 2022 no longer offering these workshops. Invite a live coding instructor to help your girls earn a STEM badge. There are a number of options. The date and time are set by the troop, flexible for multi-level troops. Plus an option to purchase a fun patch for each girl. Learn more and sign up for a workshop now Creative Challenges We all have a lot of random things laying around our house so why not get creative. You can have them do the crafting before meeting and then share at meeting or have them gather supplies and do together and talk while crafting. Some examples to get you started you could do milk jugs, tubes (paper towel/toilet paper), Toast, egg cartoons, doll outfits out of paper. Two truths and a lie game This is a great get to know each other better game. All the girls have to do is share 2 true things about them and 1 lie in no particular order. Then everyone has to try to guess which item they listed was a lie. You could have everyone answer in comments or take turns answering. Once everyone has a chance to guess the girl shares which was a lie. Where am I? game Before the meeting gather 10 different backgrounds to change your background during meeting. Tell the girls they are going to guess where their leader is. You can take pictures of local places, do some world traveling, landmarks the girls will recognize. Then switch the background in Zoom and ask the girls…“where in the world is your leader?” The girls will love it!. Origami Creation The best way to learn how to do origami is watch someone else walk through the steps of making it. My favorite Youtube Channel that gives great step by step instructions is PPO pick one and have the girls have paper ready you can pause after each step to make sure everyone has that step done. One sentence story Start a story by saying one sentence. Once upon a time a little girl went for a walk… Then each girl takes a turn to add to the story. You could use the comments to write the additional sentences than at end read the whole story. How crazy did it get? What is unique about me? This one will take a little coordinating with parents of girls before meeting. Ask each parent to share one unique thing about their daughter. This could be anything from their hobbies or favorite toys. Then set up a quiz so at meeting you can describe one of the girls and everyone has to try to guess what girl it is. This is a great time to talk about how everyone is unique and how important it is to respect each other. Write a Meme Have the girls send you a funny picture of themselves, of their pet, of something in house, etc before meeting. Then at meeting bring up one of the pictures everyone will write in comments a funny meme that should be written for the picture. You can show them a few examples of what a Meme is like the cat one here. Then after everyone comes up with one. Have them vote what is best one. Save the winner and if you have the talent after add the title to the meme. You could use social media to add captions and save it. That way at next meeting you could show girls the finished Memes. What is Your Favorite Song? This one will take a little coordinating before meeting. Have every girl send you their favorite song. Then find the music video that goes with each song. During the meeting play part of the video. Pause it and ask girls to guess who’s favorite song it is. Continue this as you go through all the girls in troop. Or do one every time you meet. This way girls may forget what girls you already shared in past meetings. Morse Code with Flashlights This could be focus of whole meeting. First share the history of Morse Code how it started this is a great video kid friendly explanation. Then after the history give morse code a try using flashlights. Maybe do their name or another short word for others to guess. Here is a Morse Code chart for letters and numbers. Here is a morse code translator site so you could watch morse code in action when you type words in. Would you rather questions This is more for laughs and conversation. Don’t waste time coming up with them yourself this website has 100s to choose from. Drive by Bridging Event This takes you off zoom a bit but if you video tape everyone you can share the whole event on Zoom at next meeting. One idea set up a bridge at end of driveway with table of uniforms and pins. Set up a time for each girl to come to house, walk across bridge and parent puts the uniform and pin on the other side. As the leader remain further away and take video of each girl experiencing the walk across the bridge. Create comics Using Pixton website the girls could make their own avatar and create their very own comic strips. Nailed it challenge This could be any topic, but cake decorating and clay designs is the big ones people do. Have the professional design at meeting and then have everyone try to recreate it. When done put them side by side. #nailedit Family Member Show and Tell Ask parents if they would participate or another family member that would be willing to join a zoom meeting. Then they can share an interesting job or hobby. Have girls ask the guest questions to learn more about what they are sharing. No Sew Blankets If you are able to deliver supplies to each girl you can do the no sew blankets during the meeting. Lip Sync Fun This could be any song, but make sure it is something all the girls know. Then play the song and have everyone sing it, but lip sync style. Be Prepared Pillowcase Scavenger Hunt Tell the girls they have 3 minutes to fill a pillowcase with as many random things they can find around the house. Then when playing you will ask for random things, possibly colors, shapes, things that are used to do something, etc. Girls have to show item in their pillowcase that matches the items. Girl who has most matches win. Cooking Food Session Pick a recipe based on your girls age level. You may also need parents to participate a bit, get the ingredients before the meeting, help where needed during meeting. Cooking Show Everyone gets a chance to teach others how to cook something. Depending on time, limit the time for each girl. Tell them to have parts of the recipe ready to go or record it ahead of time. If you could be a superhero? Need something to spark conversation, ask each girl what superpower would you have? For example flying, being able to help people all the time, etc. Avatar Creation There are many sites and apps out there you can make your own avatars on. One that I find pretty cool that allows kids to make full group pictures of people is Bitmoji. It may be a bit hard for the younger girls to do on own but with some supervision they will have fun with it too. Read a book, write a author, earn a fun patch I have had the opportunity to speak to and write about Rachele Alpine two books where she encourages girls to write her, she has put together some great activities to go along with the books and offers a fun patch. Read more about the books she offers and contact her for possibly having her come do a virtual session with your troop. Make music instruments This is a chance for girls to get creative. Tell them we are going to make a instrument. Find things around your house to make something that makes music. Then let each girl share their creations. Minute to Win it Games You can turn anything into a minute to win it activity. You can have every girl do at same time or girls watch each other. Here are 12 I have done with my troop in past. Yoga Class or Party Here are some ideas for a yoga party, there are ideas for fun patches, how to make the yoga event have a theme. If you don’t want to lead the yoga search youtube for a short yoga session and play it during meeting. If you won a million dollars, what would you buy? Another great conversation starter, how many would help others, buy things for themselves, use the money to make the world a better place. Digital Escape Room If you are looking for fun and easy digital escape rooms, but don’t want to pay for one there are a number of free ones all over the web. Kids Activities website did the work for you, they compiled a pretty extensive list of ones to choose from. Troll Themed Meeting This is a very popular movie and could be made into a great virtual meeting theme. You could do a Netflix watch party if everyone has Netflix or have everyone watch before and then do activities during meeting. If you need ideas, Ill refer you to my favorite fun patch source, where activity worksheets are often included. This fun patch is no exception. Fun patch and activity sheet Frozen Themed Meeting What girl does not like the Frozen movie? There are a lot of ideas out there for this theme. I will refer you over to my favorite source for Fun Patches which also includes a lot of activities to go along with the patch. Frozen inspired fun patch and activity sheet. Photo Scavenger Hunt I know having a photo scavenger hunt as a troop would be fun, but since we can’t do it together give each girl the list and have them do the photo hunt with their parents then come to meeting and share the pictures they took with group. If you don’t know where to start with a photo scavenger hunt check out these ideas. Paint Party There are probably a lot of local business and painters who may be interested in offering a virtual paint workshop for you. If you don’t know where to start I talked to Painting with a Purpose owner and she is sharing easy to follow tutorial sessions live on Facebook in her group, then they are uploaded onto her youtube channel that you could use with troop if you can’t attend a live session. I hope your meetings are fun and you found some great ideas in this post. If you have more ideas that you want to share with other leaders send me a email and I can add them into my next list of ideas for virtual meetings. Enjoy every minute being a leader and continue to inspire your girls!