Dentistry Merit Badge

Requirement 1 needs something you do not own

1 Using X-ray (radiographic) films or images and with your counselor's guidance, do the following.

All four parts of requirement 1 sit under that opening. You study tooth structure in them, you draw a lower molar using them as a guide, and you mark two more things on that drawing.

Nobody has dental radiographs at home. They come from one of two places, and the badge names neither:

So ask before you begin, not when you reach requirement 1. The question takes one sentence and the answer decides whether the badge starts this week or next month.

The sentence in requirement 3 that expires

3 Arrange for a visit with a dentist. Before you go, ask whether your visit can include a dental examination and a plaque-control demonstration. Afterward, ask questions about things you want to know. Then tell your counselor what the dentist does during a checkup examination.

Four instructions in four sentences, and they are in time order: before, during, afterward, then. The second one is the one that gets missed, because the requirement looks like it is about going somewhere.

A plaque-control demonstration is not part of a normal appointment. It has to be asked for when the appointment is made, and asking on arrival means asking a practice whose next patient is already waiting. The last sentence is easy to miss too: the requirement is not finished when you leave the surgery, it is finished when you have told your counselor what the dentist does during a check-up.

One appointment can carry four requirements

Write the list before you telephone. A single call that says "my son is working on the Dentistry merit badge, and it needs a check-up, a plaque-control demonstration, a look at some radiographs, and half an hour to pour a stone cast" is one conversation. The same four requests made separately are four favours.

Requirement 4(b) is the one worth flagging when you ask, because it is the only one that takes the dentist's own time rather than the practice's.

Requirement 1(b)'s drawing is used three times

Three layers of labelling on one drawing. Draw it large. Half a page is not too much, and a neat little molar in the corner of a sheet cannot take the annotation the next two parts require.

Two more things about that drawing. 1(b) asks for parts AND surfaces, which are two different lists: crown, enamel, dentin, pulp, root and so on for the parts, and mesial, distal, occlusal, buccal and lingual for the surfaces. And it asks for surrounding structures, so the bone and the gum have to be there too, not just the tooth.

If you later choose 6(e), which wants drawings of the progress of dental decay, you will be drawing the same tooth again. Keep the first one.

Requirement 4: an afternoon, an appointment, or three days

You do TWO of these three.

4(a) is the obvious first pick, so the real decision is which of the other two joins it. If you are already arranging the visit for requirement 3, add 4(b) to that call and the second option costs you nothing extra. If a visit is hard to arrange, start the food record on day one and stop worrying about it.

4(c) is more than a list. You circle the items that may provide the sugars bacterial plaque needs to make acid, which uses requirement 2(a)'s explanation, and then you list snacks to avoid. Doing requirement 2 first makes the circling a decision rather than a guess.

Requirement 6: five options, and two are already half written

You do TWO of these five.

6(d) and 6(e) are the two that reuse work. 6(d)'s tobacco section is requirement 2(d) written out rather than discussed. 6(e)'s decay section is requirement 2(a), and the tooth you need to draw is the one you drew for 1(b). Neither is signposted anywhere on the badge, because no requirement names another by number.

6(a) is the one with a date in it. Showing your troop or a school class means somebody has to put you on an agenda, and a school class means asking a teacher. It is also the most enjoyable of the five, so pick it early or not at all.

6(c) is easy to underestimate. Collecting five toothpaste advertisements is quick; telling the truth about the accuracy of their claims is the actual requirement, and it needs you to know what the claims mean.

Requirement 7 is nine questions about one career

Identify three career opportunities, pick one, and then research:

Nine items, and then a discussion of what you learned and whether the career interests you. Dentistry has an unusually wide set to choose from: dentist, dental hygienist, dental assistant, dental laboratory technician, orthodontist, oral surgeon, practice manager. The three you identify do not all have to be clinical.

This is the older style of careers requirement, which asks for more detail about one career and does not name approved research methods. If you get the chance, requirement 3's visit is a room full of people doing several of these jobs at once.

What to arrange, and when

The Dentistry merit badge, drawn so the one appointment it depends on is arranged before you need it. It is not a copy of the requirements: each step is a short label with a link to the official requirements, which are what actually governs and which change from year to year.