STEP 1: START AT HOME
Your Family’s Camp Experience:
If grandparents, parents, relatives, or siblings have gone to overnight camp before, that’s the best place to start gathering information. The camps that older family members attended might still be
around, although they may have changed in quality and substance. Find out what your relatives liked and disliked about the camps they attended. If they recommend a certain camp, fill out an index card or notebook page with the relevant contact information. Add any notes you wish. Do this for each camp you’re interested in, as you work through this chapter.
Beware of you own biases as a parent. Your favorite camp from a generation ago may not meet your child’s needs and interests. As former campers and a current staff members, we know how strongly one’s attachment to a particular camp can be. You may greatly desire your son or daughter to have the exact same camping experience as you did. However, you still need do some research. The character of a camp can change with a new director or a shift in philosophy. Just because you enjoyed it 30 or 40 years ago doesn’t guarantee your child will like it today.
Friends:
A lot of people hear about a specific camp from a family friend. You know from our little autobiographies in Chapter 1 that we ended up at overnight camp because friends recommended it. Lucky for us, we loved our camp experience. However, we had both gone to other day and overnight camps that we didn’t like very much. Those, too, were recommended by friends. What’s the lesson here? Just because you trust someone as a friend does not mean you should close this book and rush to that camp. Although your friend’s choice could turn out to be a great one for your child too, every family has different interests, needs, and resources. You owe it to yourself and your child to gather information on other camps.
Of course, the advantage of getting information from a friend or family member is that it’s first-hand. It’s also a perfect opportunity for your child to ask other kids what they thought of overnight camp. They can think of questions and discuss things that might never occur to adults. After gathering opinions from parents and kids with camp experience, write the highlights of what they said on the index card or notebook page that you’ve started for that camp.
Your Family’s Camp Experience:
If grandparents, parents, relatives, or siblings have gone to overnight camp before, that’s the best place to start gathering information. The camps that older family members attended might still be
Beware of you own biases as a parent. Your favorite camp from a generation ago may not meet your child’s needs and interests. As former campers and a current staff members, we know how strongly one’s attachment to a particular camp can be. You may greatly desire your son or daughter to have the exact same camping experience as you did. However, you still need do some research. The character of a camp can change with a new director or a shift in philosophy. Just because you enjoyed it 30 or 40 years ago doesn’t guarantee your child will like it today.
Friends:
A lot of people hear about a specific camp from a family friend. You know from our little autobiographies in Chapter 1 that we ended up at overnight camp because friends recommended it. Lucky for us, we loved our camp experience. However, we had both gone to other day and overnight camps that we didn’t like very much. Those, too, were recommended by friends. What’s the lesson here? Just because you trust someone as a friend does not mean you should close this book and rush to that camp. Although your friend’s choice could turn out to be a great one for your child too, every family has different interests, needs, and resources. You owe it to yourself and your child to gather information on other camps.
Of course, the advantage of getting information from a friend or family member is that it’s first-hand. It’s also a perfect opportunity for your child to ask other kids what they thought of overnight camp. They can think of questions and discuss things that might never occur to adults. After gathering opinions from parents and kids with camp experience, write the highlights of what they said on the index card or notebook page that you’ve started for that camp.
PREVIOUS TABLE OF CONTENTS NEXT
©2009 by Jon Malinowski & Christopher Thurber. All rights reserved.
No part of this website may be copied or used in any way without permission. If you wish to share the content of this site, please link to http://summercamphandbook.com or contact us for licensing.
