Camps

Camps

I love writing about summer and winter camps, I think it's the best way to teach the children independence at a young age. And whenever I talk about camps I keep on reminding myself of my own camp experience when I accompanied my kids to their camps, I must tell you, it was a time well spent. There isn't a minute to waste; one will be occupied from the early hours of the day till maybe after ten at night; the children are really exhausted afterwards and all they need is a quick shower, into their PJ's and off to sleep. I am sure in their sleep they will be dreaming about the adventure that they had had, and would be correcting any mishaps to a more perfect scene! Say for example that a child couldn't climb the wall or the tree, or had a not so perfect bungy fall, in his or her dream that would be perfected so the brain adjust itself and creates a more positive attitude the next day.  

Also think about the friendships that are formed, and the new knowledge that was added during the week that the child is in that camp, priceless.  It is a real pity that our schools are not trying to create such an opportunity to the students in our countries.  I actually wonder why? If you think of the cost, then our parents are not that short of money! What a child spends in a weekend in shopping malls outweighs the cost of the camps, plus of course the knowledge gained outweighs that obtained in a shopping centre.  I am thinking loud here, is this the parents' responsibility or the schools'? I think it's a bit of both, plus of course there is some resistance from teachers as they have to accompany the students, and that too during their own holiday time. 

Ok, this camp that we spent couple of days in is an adventure camp where kids spend a week doing activities that will train their minds as well as their bodies.  The staff are well trained and the rooms are not bad. To add to this if we send a group then they will not be isolated, they will be amongst kids from different nationalities as well as UK kids. In western countries this is something that they do without a second thought, like the famous camp America for example, they get more than 500,000 kids a year.  This camp was started by a guy who thought that fun is a way of life, and kids have to have fun to learn well, that was over 55 years ago. Mr PGL since died but the brand remained and almost 300,000 kids attend this camp annually from all schools in the UK.  They had 28 centres and growing, and are opening in other countries as well.  Apparently the teacher say to the kids, we are doing a PGL this year and they all go Hooray!!! of course the kids think that PGL means "parents, get lost"

I must think hard to convince our families to do this, and elevate this protective nature from their brains.  Maybe I should just say, have a week off, leave your kids to us? What do you think?