This age group has very short attention spans, and they don’t like Scouts to be like school. If you are going to do a demonstration, pick something that the boys would like doing, such as a simple craft, how to prepare a food dish, or an interesting hobby like slot car racing or electric trains. Have some samples so the boys can participate.

If you can tie your demonstration into a badge that the boys are working on, this will be a plus. Maybe a “meal in armor,” (cooking in aluminum foil), or a simple useful tool made from wood that uses simple hand tools; a door stop, boot scraper, key board, bookend, something like that.

I have bee investigating making feral cat shelters from a 2′ x 8′ x 2″ sheet of construction foam with my Bear den. Take a look at http://www.neighborhoodcats.org/info/wintershelter.htm. This is a project that boys this age would love to do; can be completed in a couple of hours, and actually serves a purpose.

Keep on Scoutin’

Whatever topic you pick, be sure to have all the necessary materials so the scouts and actually handle the materials and actively follow your step-by-step instructions…and at the end, have a completed example made by their own hands. This helps to A) assure they learned the lesson; B) builds their confidence and self-esteem.

Plan the session so that you can repeat the demo more than once.

Watch carefully for the fast learners. For repeat demos, consider forming smaller groups, each with one or two fast learners “teaching back” to the others. This will help to reinforce the lesson…and if any problems arise, you step in to coach.

In the end, your lesson has a longer lasting effect since you have “mini-teachers” in place to help others long after your demo speech is done and you are no longer present.

Before your leave….do a Q & A review of your talk. The rule is simple…you ask for questions…and if they don’t have questions for you, you ask them questions about the different steps you demonstrated. This review wrap up is another way to reinforce the demo for them.

and….if they get a merit badge out of it…they will be very happy! (Note: Even if they don’t complete the full requirements for the merit badge, you can at least get them off to a strong start.)

Hope this helps…..and best wishes on your demo.

anyway, for some fun topics, how ’bout –

‘how to wrinkle a shirt’

or ‘how to tie a tie’

check these sites

http://www.speech-topics-help.com/demonstration-speech-topics.html

http://zimmer.csufresno.edu/~lcarvalho/howtoideas.htm