An air of excitement floats throughout the room.

Little girls’ voices chatter about the day while they munch on a snack.

A voice then calls for attention to introduce the lesson for the afternoon.

Senior Sarah Moore leads a Daisy troop of 12 first-graders.

Before she could become a leader, Sarah took the required training classes, which included a leadership essentials course, a class on Daisies and becoming CPR and first-aid certified.

After training, Sarah was able to lead a Daisy troop of five kindergartners

She said she enjoys teaching all the girls about things they might not know yet, like the virtues.

“It is so much fun — I probably have just as much fun as the girls,” Sarah said. “It is fun to plan activities to help them learn something that is completely new to them.”

As a troop leader, Sarah plans all the meetings and develops the activities to educate the girls on the lesson of the day.

Sarah made a life-size board game where the girls got to be the pieces to stress the importance of being honest and fair.

To teach the girls about the virtues of courage and strength, Sarah took the troop to a fire station. At the fire station, the firefighters gave the troop a tour of the station, including where they slept and where they made their food. The girls also toured the inside of a firetruck, where they were able to put on the headsets the firefighters wear. They also got the chance to see Sarah hooked up to a heart rate monitor, and, in the end, they all got free plastic firefighting hats.

Sarah participated in Girl Scouts until she reached eighth-grade and always wanted to be a troop leader.

She said the virtues she learned as a Girl Scout help her teach her girls.

“I feel like I use a lot of the virtues that I learned in Girl Scouts today,” she said. “It teaches you life-long lessons. I am stepping outside of my comfort zone and being courageous by standing in front of these girls and teaching them something they will use for the rest of their lives.”

When she was in Girl Scouts, fellow troop-member senior Lauren Worley said Sarah was very involved.

“She was always up to try anything,” Worley said. “She was always participating and there for everything. [She was] a good role model.”

Sarah’s mother Pam Moore was the leader of Sarah’s troop starting in fourth grade. Sarah said that her mother influenced her to become a leader.

“She has always liked kids, so it is a natural fit for her,” Pam said.

However, Sarah said it can be challenging at times to think of the activities for the meetings.

“When you are teaching a first-grader what responsibility is, they might have an idea of what it means,” she said. “But it can be difficult thinking of a game that they can play involving it.”

Pam said all the planning and organizing Sarah puts into her troop has a very positive effect on her.

“It has forced her to look beyond what is going to happen today,” Pam said.

Sarah said leading her Daisy troop helped improve her patience.

“With lots of things that I think should go really quickly, they could take longer to get, or want to do the activity the whole time,” she said. “They just have a blast doing anything.”

Sarah said the goal of the Daisy troop is to obtain all the petals, meaning they have learned all the virtues, within two years.

“I love what they stand for,” Sarah said. “It really instills virtues you will use for the rest of your life.”