Trefoil News January/February 2016 Issue No: 635 Published by: Irish Girl Guides, Trefoil House, 27 Pembroke Park, Dublin 4. Printed by: Richardson and Watts, 36 Thornville Park, Raheny, Dublin 5. The Editorial Team of Trefoil News reserves the right to edit material submitted. Publications Officer: Katherine Ryan. Contact : [email protected] Message from the International Commissioner/ Intro to World Thinking Day Page 1 Celebrating World Thinking Day / WAGGGS Connect Pack Page 2 #Connect10Million Activity Page 3 Learn more about CGI Page 4 World Thinking Day Fund Page 5 World Thinking Day Ceremony Pages 6-7 Noticeboard Page 8 IGGNite 2017 / Dates for your Diary Page 9 Stitch’s Diary Page 10 North Pole to South Pole — Join IGG’s Trek Page 11 NPT Updates / Trefoil Guild International Connections Page 12 Membership Page 13 Volunteer - NWCI Rep Needed Page 14 Spotlight on Jean Douglas Page 15 Out and About Pages 16-20 Ladybirds Pages 21-24 Includes some international themed ideas to help your Ladybirds connect with Guiding around the world and a few Valentine’s Day crafts for you too Brownies Pages 25-28 Includes lots of World Thinking Day activity ideas. Plus your chance to apply for the Brownie Breakout 2016 and final reminder for expressing interest in the Olympic badge Guides Pages 29-34 Includes teamwork games to get your Guides thinking about connections and WAGGGS activities to help them complete their World Guiding interest badge. Plus congratulations to 2015’s Gold Award Guides Senior Branch Pages 35-36 Includes a report on November Senior Branch Weekend and seeking an organiser for the Chief Commissioner’s Award 2016 - it could be you! International Pages 37-44 Includes Travellers’ Tales and upcoming International Opportunities including your chance to apply for the Juliette Low Seminar and the Diane Dixon Memorial Scholarships. A special focus on the four World Centres and becoming a Friend, information about EraScout, plus details of International's upcoming Go Global Day Inserts: OGM Leaflet QQI Awards Information Cover Art: Members from the Bandon District with the WAGGGS Connect puzzle pieces. Photography by Ciara Deasy. Happy New Year to you and your family, you are all very welcome to this 2016 International Edition of Trefoil News. I sit here in the immediate aftermath of the tragedies in Lebanon and Paris among others that reach our news and interrupt our lives for fleeting moments. For weeks my Facebook feed was filled with tinges of blue, white and red as people struggled to offer support and solidarity to our brothers and sisters in France. The moment passed but perhaps not the sentiment… our theme for World Thinking Day this year is ‘Connect’. Connect with Me, with Friends, with WAGGGS, with the World. Guiding, through our volunteer Leaders, has so much to offer our young people to find their way to connect with the wider world as they struggle to understand the global issues of our times. We can and should be offering them something deeper than ‘liking’ a post on Facebook. How we respond to contemporary issues today will help shape their minds and their futures. Do not shy away from the difficult conversations, direct them to places that help open their minds, lead them through activities that help question what the media presents, and support them to make tangible efforts to make their world a better place for all of us to live in. This summer many IGG groups will be travelling to attend international events and expanding their International friendships. I am sure these connections with other like-minded young people will inspire them to see their world as a place of hope. Good luck to Christine Cronin as she leads our National Contingent to Roverway in France and Hanne Naughton and Ruth Corkery who will be leading the National Contingent to Roihu in Finland. For those of you keen to start planning your own international adventures, be sure to sign up for the next International Permit training. As always your International Committee is here to help you plan every step of the way, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. I look forward to meeting many of you at our National Table Quiz finals in January and Go Global Days in April this year. Remember it’s not too late to organise an Area round for your table quiz and if only one Unit in an Area is interested in the quiz they are more than welcome to come to the National Finals. Yours in Guiding Lorna Finnegan International Commissioner WORLD THINKING DAY Every year on 22nd February Girl Guides and Girl Scouts globally celebrate World Thinking Day. Together Girl Guides and Girl Scouts give thanks and show appreciation for the international friendship they find in our movement and raise money to help grow and share the movement with more girls and young women around the world. Thinking Day started in 1926, the date February 22nd was selected because it is the mutual birthday of Robert Baden Powell the founder of the Boy Scout movement and his wife Olave, who served as the World Chief Guide. This day each year gives us the opportunity to celebrate that we are one in ten million members of the biggest global family and to think of those less fortunate. We hope you enjoy our World Thinking Day ceremony and all the appropriately themed activities in this issue. Have a Happy World Thinking Day. Trefoil News January/February 2016 Page 1 CELEBRATING WORLD THINKING DAY Each year World Thinking Day has a theme, this year the theme is Connect. WAGGGS invites you to explore and celebrate the meaningful connections that make our lives better, whether to the people closest to us, to a place we care about, or to a Guiding friend on the other side of the world. Making more positive connections matters, because it helps us to be happy. But what does it mean to feel truly connected i.e. connected to who we are, connected to where we are, and connected to the people around us? There are some easy actions you can take to celebrate World Thinking Day this year: 1. Download the WAGGGS World Thinking Day pack and complete some of the fun activities from it. 2. Use the activities provided by your Branch in this months’ Trefoil News. 3. Follow the instructions on page 3 to make a large photo frame and share your activities/celebrations with IGG and WAGGGS on social media. 4. Use our World Thinking Day ceremony on pages 6/7 to give girls a chance to think about how they are connected and to make a collection for the World Thinking Day Fund and send the total raised to National Office. CONNECT PACK WAGGGS has made it easy for groups to celebrate World Thinking Day and earn their World Thinking Day badge at the same time with the Connect pack — available to download now from www.wagggs.org/en/resources/world-thinking-day-activity-pack-2016-connect or scan the QR code on the right How does the activity pack work? This year’s pack is a puzzle challenge in five parts. Your Unit chooses one activity from each of the first four sections, to get four puzzle pieces. Finally, they put their puzzle together and complete their last activity, to #connect10million with the world. Each section has some very simple and quick activities, and some that take a bit longer or give a greater challenge. How do you earn the badge? Simply complete one activity from each section. Connect with me: If we take the time to connect with ourselves and understand what makes us happy and confident, we can make a bigger difference in other people’s lives. Connect with friends: Connection is friendship and friendship is happiness. So what makes a good friend? Connect with someone you care about, introduce a friend to Guiding, and explore the relationships that matter to you. Connect with WAGGGS: Look wider and connect with the amazing world of Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting. Feel like one in ten million, learn about our global Movement and visit a WAGGGS World Centre! Connect with the world: Look wider still and see how you can make a difference in the places you care about. Go outdoors and get active, get to know your community or a place in nature, and learn something about the world around you. Try to work through the sections in order with the #connect10million activity coming at the end, as it pulls the programme together and asks girls to reflect on what they learned from the other activities. How long does it take? The activities have been planned so that your Unit can make all five connections in a 90 minute meeting. If your group has more time they can choose some of the longer activities, use the “take it further” ideas or complete extra activities. What does the Leader need to do? Just make time to look through the pack in advance and identify where you might need to adapt activities. Because the pack is for youth members of all ages from 146 different countries, you may need to adapt activities to fit your Unit. Try to keep to the learning outcome (at the beginning of each activity) but if you want to change how the activity is done, go ahead. You know your Unit best! Why not arrange some time together with your Unit to plan the activities? What’s the best way to do it? Empowering young people to take the lead is the heart of the Girl Guide and Girl Scout method, and it makes the experience feel a lot more relevant and fun! Support them to choose the activities they would like to do, to work as a team in completing activities, and to take simple roles in planning and delivering activities.