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When immersed in nature, campers learn skills as life broadens in newness, freshness, and intensity. Woodlands, lakes, and streams offer ample space to express feelings safely, whether positive or negative. Canoe or raft trips down hundreds of miles of river, bus, and hiking trips into the mountains, daily excitement of swimming, fishing, watching a chipmunk, or carving a piece of cedar -what better way to explore, experiment, and "find oneself?"
Responsible Living
From the time they arrive, campers are partners in all that happens to them. They and their counselors or "Chiefs" make daily plans at least a week in advance, considering all basic needs of safe and responsible living. They construct shelters, cook meals two days a week, cut wood, care for equipment, maintain trails, and "have fun."
With a well-balanced program, the tasks themselves provide objective discipline and a sense of personal worth. Groups then think of "our plans" rather than "grown-up orders." One camper put it, " Around here we live with our answers." How true when a meal tastes good or a sturdy shelter keeps one dry!
The Small Peer Group
The heart of therapeutic camping is the structured small group process in the out-of-doors. Each group consists of ten campers and two "chiefs." In the group, the camper learns the power of his influence, especially when his actions are mirrored in eleven pairs of eyes. Honesty becomes real as group members learn to trust each other in the dynamic friendliness of close group living.
Problem Solving
Daily routine is relaxed enough for the group to deal with behavior problems as they arise. Discovering the best solution may take minutes - or hours. Each person is led to express himself freely. "Problems are our business" and the solving of problems is the key to camper progress. When needed, chiefs work with a camper alone, but the group is the real instrument of change.
Within broad but firm limits, attitudes and actions improve most quickly in this helpful peer group. When they have figured out how to have the most fun together, they find a way to make it work.
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| Camper Writings |
A Place Great and Fair
Is there a place so great and fair,
Where moths still dance (most days) in the air?
Where stumps, yet blackened in remembrance of long past blaze still stand?
Where the air is easily inhaled by every creature, from the tiniest of insects to the sleeping black bear?
Is there a place so wonderfully bare of all the things that make life for me hard?
A place where work is foreign and the farmer doesn't dread the rising of the big orange ball?
Where the glorious sunshine hits the earth in a fragrance of color, that makes trout and bass jump and the streams look like silver?
A place where moss covers rocks for you to lay, softer than a bed of feathers and hay?
Where a shriveled-up leaf with its stem still in place, looks like a field mouse ready to race?
Oh, I beg you to tell me if you know the place, where the tops of oak trees clatter when the wind blows.
The place is the woods, if you know it or not, the best place to live, learn and be taught.
Ryan, a camper |
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