Week 3

 I have finished my training here at Camp Mason and this has been quite the week. Last Saturday was my first day working with actual kids. Comfort Zone was the group that came which is a camp for children ages 7 through 17 who are grieving a major loss in their lives. I thought it was going to be a depressing group but they were so fun and full of energy.  In the morning I got the chance to observe ASE which is the Action Socialization experience. It was really good to see how the other naturalists conduct their sessions. In the afternoon I ran the rock wall which was more hectic than I thought it would be. It was run as a recreation period so kids could come and go as they pleased rather than as a structured class time.

The comfort zone group is set up with littles and bigs so each grieving child is paired with an older group member that is there to guide them. I had a young boy Nicholas who was really shy and time, he wanted to climb to the top but he was a little nervous so his big promised that he would climb whatever Nicholas climbed which was really cute until I had to belay this 200 pound man up a rock wall. The day went really well; almost all my climbers made it and they each challenged themselves to push further. Because I am so terrified of heights and climbing the rock wall I have a hard time with the motivational speaking part like when a kid starts to get scared and wants to come down I give in so easily because I think it’s a miracle they got that far. But I will get better at the motivational talk from the ground I learn so much from the people around me.

On Wednesday of this week we were so fortunate to attend the Tri State American Camping Association conference in Atlantic City. The conference offered a bunch of different classes that we got to choose from. They were classes designed to improve camp teaching styles. It was really informative and I took a lot of good tips away from the classes. We stayed one night at the Resorts hotel on the boardwalk. My fellow naturalists and I let loose and had a good time in AC. I might have had too much fun but I did make it through the rest of the conference the next day. Atlantic City has a charming boardwalk which has a mini carnival complete with a Ferris wheel. Some parts of the boardwalk are a little sketchy but it was great to see the Atlantic Ocean and spend some time in 60 degree temperatures.

Friday we returned to camp and got to learn boating on the tiny man made pond here at Camp Mason it was really nice because it got up to 70 degrees on Friday! So basically we got paid to canoe back and forth on the pond in the sunshine if we would have had beer it would have a been a vacation. However the light schedule is over starting Monday I will be teaching for real!! We have school groups all next week and I could not be more nervous. I will be working with a group of 8^th graders from a Friend school which means it’s a Quaker school. I’m still not sure what that means but apparently they are expected to be an above average group. I will be teaching geology, wetlands and directing a service project. Also I will be leading a four hour hike to the fire tower in the water gap. I have spent all day preparing and I will doing this again all day tomorrow. I am learning so much myself I just hope I can give an interesting class to these kids.  

I’m sure next time I will have so much to share.

Also as a side note I would like to express my sorrow for the recent Gregori Family losses. It breaks my heart and I am so sorry I could not be there to show my support during this sad time. Let’s just get through the rest of March :)