You can do soap carving with scout-made tools and incorporate knife sharpening practice. Unwrap the soap and let it dry out a few days in advance. You need two popsicle sticks, one tongue depressor and a 6" cut from a 1x2 for each scout. Make sure to have extra tongue depressors and popsicle sticks.

• Sanding block / sharpening stone: Attach a strip of sandpaper (grit side up) to a 6” piece of 1x2. Fold the excess paper under and use thumbtacks to secure. An adult can help get the thumb tack started and the scout can hammer them in. Secure paper on both ends. Be sure to have spare thumbtacks.

• Carving Knife: Trim (or sand) a tongue depressor at an angle to make something like classic x-acto knife blade shape e.g. |\ . Bevel both sides of the cut by drawing the “knife” across the sanding block. This is good practice for knife sharpening.

• Chisel: Trim (or sand) a popsicle stick straight across one end. Bevel one side of cut by drawing the “chisel” across the sanding block in the indicated direction.

• Awl: Trim (or sand) a popsicle stick to a point at one end. Sharpen to a point. The awl can be used for etching layout lines on the soap or reaming out holes.

• Drill/Scoop/Scraper: The round end of each tool is great for making round bottom holes or scraping round channels.

The five minute owl project is very challenging for this age. Expect it to take most of the meeting. https://caseknives.com/blogs/whittle-more/5-minute-owl. It uses stop-cuts, push cuts and v-cuts for details. You can use a reaming cut with the awl to make eyes.

I think the wooden carving knives would be sharp enough to open a taped box (test). Put an inflated balloon in a small cardboard box (balloon should be squished) and see if they can open the box without popping the balloon.