Jodi's reflection
Now that summer camp is coming to a close, explain 3 key takeaways from the experience? How will you apply it in the future?
A takeaway I could take away from this camp is definitely increased patience on my end, as I’ve learned that many of the campers in my age group struggled with the curriculum prepared. Spending time one-on-one slowly with them was necessary for them to have takeaways from the academic periods. Another takeaway I got from this experience is being able to think on the spot faster. The campers very easily got bored of the curriculum (soccer or basketball), so I had to come up with games to play within the time period we were given. One last takeaway is the friendships I’ve made with both the campers and my co-counsellors. I’m grateful I’ve gotten to know the high school counsellors, because working with them made my time more enjoyable. I’m definitely going to miss the campers, and they’ve shown us that in the end, all our efforts were worth it through the little misspelled letters and notes.
Describe one of the biggest challenges you faced, how you overcame it, and what you learned from it.
One of the biggest challenges I faced was working with such a small group of campers. In my previous camp counsellor roles, I was working with a large group, ranging from 20-60 campers. So, when that shrunk to less than 10 campers every week, I was a little shaken by how I interacted with them. Normally, in a big group of kids, they would naturally form their own friendships, but having a shy group of 7 or 8 campers was difficult as they could very easily sit in silence on their own. Instead of inserting myself once in a while to see how they’re doing, I found myself taking the role of starting their friendships. Asking “what’s your favourite…”, “What did you do this weekend…” questions was one way of easing the tension in the classroom.
To close off the term on a high note, what were 3 highlights from your time at YRES?
A highlight from this summer was the friendships I’ve made at camp. Even though I was not teaching the intermediate class, there was one little girl who just clung onto me. She was really sweet and she always said “I want to take you home with me”. Another highlight was getting to know the senior girls. They’re all pretty shy, and would just speak Mandarin to each other, but when I ask them questions, they would be eager to tell me about what they do after camp. The last highlight is having the senior boys warm up to me. I would be the “strict” counsellor, trying to keep order in the classroom, so it would seem like they didn’t like me. But by the end of camp, we’ve formed our own weird bond, where they would try to outsmart us, but it wouldn’t work. It was sweet in their own little way.
What is some advice/tip that you would offer to future staff?
Advice I would give to future staff is that you kind of set the mood in the beginning of the day, so being positive, greeting the campers, being more energetic than them is what gets the day going. They’re at camp to hopefully have fun, and especially in the first week, you have to set the tone for that.
Please nominate someone who deserves the employee of the month award and explain why briefly. You can nominate more than one person.
I would like to nominate Aminah as employee of the month. She definitely does more than is asked without complaining, and did a really good job managing our camp site. She was really busy but still had time to answer our questions and plan for the day. I don’t think she was told enough that she did a really good job, but she did so she deserves the employee of the month award. 🙂
English (Canada) 
Français du Canada 