For a cooking fire you want to make lots of red-hot embers, so use sticks about half or three-quarters of an inch thick.
For a signalling fire to make a flare at night use dry gorse, straw, or dry twigs in large quantities.
For a smoke signalling fire use plenty of thin dry sticks and twigs to give burning flame, and add leaves and grass to make the smoke.
Camping
One of the ripping things about Girl Scout work is the camp life. You go out either to live in farm buildings, or in an empty house, or in tents.
People talk of “roughing it” in tents, but those people are generally Tenderfoots. A wise Scout does not “rough it”; she knows how to look after herself and how to make herself comfortable by a hundred little dodges.
For instance, if the tents have not turned up she doesn’t sit down to shiver and grumble, but at once sets to work to rig up a shelter or hut for herself. She chooses a good spot for it where she is not likely to be flooded out if a rainstorm comes.
Then she lights up a camp fire, cooks her food, and makes herself comfortable on her mattress of ferns or straw.