Earning a Girl Scout badge

Lulu has roped DH and I into helping her earn her Creative Solutions badge. Really, she hates to listen to us talk about work at the dinner table so she has chosen to turn the conversation around to something that she would be more interested in. This badge requires more talking and thinking, rather than doing, and has been fun for us all.

First up…

Local, National, and Global Problem Solving

Come up with a list of 10 local, national, or global problems. Then, select one item from your list and come up with three different ways to help your community (or the larger society) deal with that problem.

We took turns and came up with these problems:

1. Trash in the community pond. (DH)
2. Bad behavior in school. (Lulu)
3. Polluted Chesapeake Bay. (Mom)
4. Too many home foreclosures. (DH)
5. Some animals are becoming extinct due to overhunting. (Lulu)
6. Hunger in poor countries. (Mom)
7. Gas prices getting too high which is making things expensive. (Lulu)
8. Global warming. (Mom)
9. Deforestation and destruction of the rain forest. (DH)
10. People are losing their jobs because businesses can’t pay them. (Lulu)

We used a voting system to narrow the list down to one problem to solve. The list was wittled down to polluted Chesapeake Bay and trash in community pond. Trash in the community pond finally won. Our solutions ideas were:

(Lulu) Tell people not to litter. Make a sign and put out a recycle or trash bin next to the pond.

(DH) Put trash cans around the community which gives people a place to throw trash. Even if a walker wants to pick up the trash, there isn’t a place to dispose of it unless you carry it back home with you.

(Mom) Go get the trash out of the pond ourselves.


What about you? What 10 problems would your family come up with? How would you solve one of them.


Coming soon: If you were stranded on a desert island and could bring one person and 5 items, who and what would you bring?