It's All In Your Mind
York Adams Council
From Santa Clara County Council 1996 Pow Wow Book

JUMPING JACK: Stand up and jump once; then say "Boinggg" and sit down.

RUNNING RALPH: Stand up and run in place; bring feet down three times, say "Zippp" and sit down.

COMPUTER CHARLIE: Stand up and, in robot fashion, swing arms back and forth saying "Does compute. Does Compute" then sit down.

This is a story about a boy called JUMPING JACK and another one named RUNNING RALPH, and still another boy called COMPUTER CHARLIE. These three boys were all friends and they stuck pretty close together around the neighborhood.

JUMPING JACK got his nickname because everywhere he went he was always jumping over things for no apparent reason except that he liked to jump. You would see the boys walking along the street with JUMPING JACK jumping over benches, curbs, fences, and almost anything that wasn't too high.

As you probably guessed, RUNNING RALPH got his name because he was always running. Maybe it's because his legs were shorter than those of his two friends, which meant that he had to run to keep up with them.

COMPUTER CHARLIE got his name because he was a very intelligent boy and he excelled in mental skills. Everyone teased COMPUTER CHARLIE because he wasn't good in sports and wasn't as strong as his friends JUMPING JACK and RUNNING RALPH. However, this didn't matter to them because the three boys were great friends and went everywhere together.

One day something happened to prove to all the other children that COMPUTER CHARLIE was just as valuable to this world as anyone else, and that having strong muscles is not more important than being good in mental skills.

The three boys, JUMPING JACK, RUNNING RALPH, and COMPUTER CHARLIE, were on their way to the store one day when suddenly they saw the local bank being robbed and the robber making his get-away. JUMPING JACK jumped over hedges and fences hurrying to a neighbor's house to call the police. RUNNING RALPH was right beside him. But COMPUTER CHARLIE just stood there watching the whole thing. The swiftness of the two boys brought the police running to the scene of the robbery. The policeman began asking questions. But JUMPING JACK and RUNNING RALPH could tell them nothing about the robbery because they had been too busy running to telephone the police. But COMPUTER CHARLIE began rattling off a long list of facts about the model and color of the car, the license number, the direction the robber went, and a full description of the robber. His mental abilities were a great help to the police.

After reading about it in the local newspaper, all the other children were so proud of COMPUTER CHARLIE that they never again teased him about his mental skills. They came to realize that the COMPUTER CHARLIE's of the world are just as important as the JUMPING JACK's and RUNNING RALPH's, because when they all pool their talents, they can accomplish great things!

The Little Computer Who Could
Mt. Diablo Silverado Area

This is an audience participation skit. Divide the pack into as many groups as there are parts. When the character is mentioned in this story, the group assigned to that character makes the designated sound.

Old Computer - "Not Enough Memory At This Time"
Cub Scout - "Do Your Best"
Cubmaster - "Does Not Compute, Does Not Compute"
New Computer - "Save that Screen!"
Den Leader - "Log on, Log on"

It was December, and the Cubmaster announced that the theme the next month was "Does Not Compute". The Den Leaders announced this theme to their Cub Scouts. The Cub Scouts were quite excited about the innovative theme. They could not wait to start learning things about their New Computers. The Den Leader announced that their Cubmaster wanted the Cub Scouts to come to the Pack Meeting with new things to show and tell about their computers. One Cub Scout, Tommy, had a very Old Computer. It belonged to his Den Leader when he was a boy. The Cub Scout did not feel that his Old Computer would work as well as the other boy's New Computers. Each week the Cub Scouts came to the den meeting with their notebooks full of computer paper from the previous week's den assignments. The Cub Scouts were all excited to share what their New Computers had done. Tommy was very sad because he felt his Old Computer's work was not good enough. Tommy would not show any of the other Cub Scouts what he had in his notebook. The Den Leader kept asking Tommy to share, but he came up with all sorts of excuses.

Finally, the night of the Pack Meeting came, and the Cub Scouts all assembled to show their month's work with great anticipation. The Cubmaster asked the Den Leaders one by one to have their den come up and explain what the boys had learned and done. As the Cub Scouts went up den by den, Tommy heard and saw all of the wonderful things that the New Computers could do. Eventually, it was Tommy's dens turn. Each boy explained what he had done and it was now Tommy's turn. Tommy looked down at this notebook full of papers and took a deep breath. Tommy explained that he only had an Old Computer and that he didn't want to show anyone what he had done. Earl, Tommy's good friend, pulled one of the papers out of Tommy's notebook and exclaimed, "Wow!! This is neat!" Everyone jumped up and ran to the paper. Earl said, "Look at how Tommy's Old Computer printed this graph. It doesn't look as smooth and refined as mine, but it looks cool. It has a lot of dots on it." Tommy's face was red, but he explained to everyone about the dot matrix printer. He explained that back in the old days that is how all Old Computers printed. He said that the New Computers usually have laser printers that make things look different than the old printers. After the meeting, all of the Den Leaders and Cub Scouts told Tommy they really enjoyed leaning about his Old Computer. The Cubmaster came up to Tommy and told him how proud he was of Tommy and that he was glad his Old Computer had such a good home. Tommy went home and gave his Old Computer a big hug. He said, "I'll never trade you in on a New Computer because you do what the Cub Scout motto says "Do Your Best."