Talk to your SATT or Fieldcraft Officer, they should be able to help conduct IWT and tests.
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It’s a written test. Read a few pages of text and then answer a load of questions about body colour, fuse burn times, safety distances etc. Don’t get to actually hold any pyros.
excuse me if i am missing the point but when did Fieldcraft have to become “professional” and structured…where has the element of “fun” gone if all we can do is structured training?
when it comes to AT, we can incorporate fun into navigation tasks, or ball games into paddlesports, even a competitive side to climbing.
I have run various board games as a radio exercise during Squadron (Hangman and Guess Who? the favourites)
i am not advocating ignoring what is in the book, but as a good Wg Cdr Friend said to me often:
if you print out and stack up all the ACPs and ACTOs they come to here >points to body< on me, and no where in any of these pages says we cannot have fun during our training
this approach sounds like any motivation through enjoyment has been sucked out of the activity - participation and attendance is only do so to progress further through the syllabus
providing the skills being taught and practised, are relevant and have a purpose, is there something so wrong in making the application “fun” and appropriate for teenagers?
perhaps I am too “old skool” and hark back to the days when we had fun…?
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Nothing Minion said prevents fun. You need to teach the lessons properly, and then you’re free to create any scenario you want to put the skills into practice.
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oh ok then - i took reply reply to pEp the suggestion that running around the local woods playing capture the flag wasn’t permitted and experiences should be more structured with “professional” lessons
Nah, you can still do that, you just need to tie it into what you’re teaching, so that it has a structured aim as opposed to a Lord of the Flies aspect.
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Pretty much this, yes. What the end scenario is mostly irrelevant, but lacking forethought and reverting to lazy, aimless exercises does get boring for cadets.
Unless you dress it up better, hide and seek is just hide and seek…
In the AT example, those lessons are still delivered to a standard with fun injected on top of the quality of delivery and practice.
And also, why is there an implication that the achievement of hitting targets and practicing skills in a more “professional” exercise isn’t (or can’t also be) fun? Positive feedback, achieving goals, and recognising their own development can also give those hormone hits. We’re not in the realms of “that was terrible, give me 10 and do it again” training here…
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Looking at today’s Weekly Brief, it’s nice to see a comms plan for the launch of the fieldcraft policy. I’m sure it will generating lots of excitment on social media. However, that will also generate lots of questions from cadets and staff, before the policy is published. This seems back to front to me. Or is that just me that doesn’t care about social media posts and just wants to see some policy that I can read and start planning and delivering with?
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We’re engaging the customers… if we don’t do socials people moan… if we do people moan.
Some CFAVs might be interested and it is stirring up some discussion which is healthy.
Join the Teams chat and we’ll likely put stuff in there the night before it hits socials.
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If the gold syllabus only takes cadets to 2IC-level, who commands the section?
JLs?
Words
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Army cadets
The CCF cadets?
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All well and good if 1/8th of a sqn’s cadets happen to be QJLs.
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Role players I’d imagine?
From re-enactment groups?
Usually CFAV but potentially senior cadets. We’ll have to see what the new policy says
Staff?
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My initial thoughts are:
April is a bit of an awkward time to release in terms of planning. Requires a quick turnaround to get training and exercises planned and booked, and reduces the likelihood of new instructor courses coming in a timely fashion.
The calendar seems a bit upside down - “the need for a syllabus” being after the syllabus has been explained, then the instructor stuff right at the end? Will the instructor information be released earlier behind the scenes? Otherwise there are weeks of potential enquiries without knowing what or who can do anything.
There are plenty of places that will struggle to implement this in 2024 due to these timescales and lack of instructors.
Seriously? Officers, WOs, and SNCOs doing cpls’ jobs?
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