Week 10

I haven't worked many hours this week, as the last follow-up was enough to keep me occupied.  Hanging out with the youth leaders this past weekend was a tremendous learning experience.  The challenge now is quickly processing and recording the things I learned into legitimate products.  

This week I have produced my own version of Mentor/Mentee applications, reviewed some additional information about the toy drive, estimated the amount of hours I should have by the time the practicum ends, and perused the Masters of Social Work application information.  I've been trying to organize my portfolio products to ensure that I will have a complete set of products to turn in with the final learning plan.  A lot of my products will be nearing completion soon, and I am excited to be a part of it all.  

Week 9ish- Second Follow-up

What fun!  Friday night was the start of the two-night follow-up for youth leaders returning to camp.  I felt far less stressed this weekend as there's only one more midterm to go, and since I knew most of the kids that would be coming to camp, I felt prepared.  I was paired with Ruble (a counselor my age) to go on "transport" to pick up a few youth leaders that didn't have a ride to camp.  The first youth (age 15, female) lived about 25 minutes away from camp.  Ruble and I knocked on the door at about 8:00 pm.  Both the mother and youth showed up at the door looking a little confused.  The youth recognized us and went into a conversation about how she was going to the movies tonight, and not to camp.  She said she called Tim to tell him she wouldn't be attending this particular follow-up.  Ruble and I were a bit disappointed, so we told her how we felt.  Everyone but the youth seemed contingent on the youth attending camp instead of the movies, but the youth was not packed and she had plans.  The mother invited us in to talk because it was chilly, then an argument ensued.  The mother said she would feel much better if the youth were at camp and not at the movies.  The youth was very upset and threw "a fit" as she later called it.  Ruble and I sat and talked to the mother for about an hour while the youth stormed through the house and packed her things.  The youth got a phone call in the middle of her packing, too.  One of her friends called to tell her that a few people the youth does not get along with showed up at the movie they had plans to attend.  We all decided it was fate, but the youth was still a bit grumpy.  Her mood improved as the weekend progressed.  A learning plan product examines this further.  Once we had all the kids picked up, we arrived at camp fashionably late.  Tim had started the introductory meeting where all the kids decide on rules for camp and talk about plans for the weekend.  The youth leaders also carved pumpkins while we were away.  Everyone was fairly attentive, but excited to break into activities for the weekend.  We had smores around a campfire that night and everyone exchanged their latest stories.  I slept in the boys' cabin with Ruble and two other counselors.  This was a stinky endeavor in more ways than one.  I thought the boys would be less rowdy than the girls' cabin was last weekend.  Nope.  Blaring music, video games, cell phone conversations, gameboy races, deep voices, limited sleep...  I also thought the boys would wake up later in the morning.  I was wrong there, too.  It was like pulling teeth trying to get the boys settled and keep the lights out, then we had to turn around and wake up early.  Saturday was busy, busy, busy.  We had breakfast, a morning activity, and then  my group jumped right into preparing for the haunted house.  We hung black tarp up to cover windows, bunkbeds, and doors.  We moved a ton of furniture around to suit our needs.  We spray painted some surfaces, added cobwebs, turned on some festive lighting, cranked up the music and made plans to scare people right up to lunch.  After lunch, we finalized our cabin, did a run-through of our haunted house without costumes for all youth leaders and staff to see.  We also went through the other haunted house that another group had been preparing that was supposed to be the "scarier" haunted house.  We met back in the dining hall for a quick dinner before guests started arriving at 5:30.  The Haunted Happening had games, food, pictures, costume contest, and trick-or-treating.  

I was the greeter for the first haunted house.  Families would walk my way, and I would offer to give them a tour of our "less scary" haunted house.  I had a lot of time to talk to families about costumes, their involvement with camp, and their ideas about the community because we had a bit of a line at some points in the night.  One of the youth leaders (the first one we picked up Friday night) offered to be the tour guide even though she was not part of our group originally.  She would take the group to meet "Bobo" the clown in the first room where there was a haunted circus theme.  We played Halloween music through a speaker system provided by a youth and using my iPod.  The next room was padded with mattresses.  The youth in this room was pretty scary when he jumped out behind the padding.  The next room had a doll theme.  We had the tour guide begin by saying, "There was once a lady who couldn't have kids so she became a witch and brought her dolls to life..."  Inside the "doll room" were two very alive dolls in perfect little dresses and pigtails.  The only light was a nightlight and the only movement was from the youth's mouths as they sat dressed as dolls singing creepy songs.  There was a fog machine clouding the air and stuffed animals lining the floor.  The next room had a vampire theme, a tunnel, a dead body, chains slapping wood, and a couple excellently prepared vampires.  There was a bunkbed to crawl through to escape the house.  The kids did an AWESOME job of putting on a show for about 8 large groups of families.  Each time a group went through, there was a different level of scariness.  Several screams were heard, and a few smaller kids decided to get out while they were still in the first part.  We had a lighted house when kids came through for trick-or-treating.  We were all still in costume.  I handed out candy through some arm-holes carved out of a tarp.  Creepy!  Clean-up was exhausting, and it took all my energy to keep people on-task.  I was working just as hard to get everything put away in time for the next activity.  We all met in the Peace Center for a movie (Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull).  I had the chance to tell the whole group that I was incredibly proud of the work they did for the Haunted Happening.  I was especially happy with my group for being so cooperative, open to new ideas, quick to clean-up, and responsible.  I had a blast!  The movie was cut short because everyone, including vampires, was soooo tired.  We crashed out in our respective cabins, woke up for breakfast, did some more cleaning, and broke out into two groups.  One group talked about "what I want out of follow-ups" and the other group did an activity with Tim about the conduct that makes leaders "good."  Surprisingly, most of the youths would like to do more community service at follow-ups.  They ALSO want to learn foreign languages and have reading and math tutoring.  I was on transport by myself afterward.  I got to talk with one of my new favorite youth leaders for about an hour on the way to her house.  The weekend was a HUGE success.  

Week 8ish-First Follow-up

This past weekend was the first October Follow-up.  I finally got to meet some youth leaders and spend some quality time getting to know what it is they are planning for next weekend's Follow up.  On Friday night, I came to camp at about 4 to review the Learning plan and remember tasks I assigned myself for follow-up.  I began to get nervous for some unknown reason.  I met one of the head counselors from the summer and another volunteer over dinner.  Staff met in the program office afterward to discuss some of the projects that would happen.  The kids arrived at about 7:00-8:00.  Check in was a lot to keep up with.  Another intern and I were in charge of handing out information and checking off who had paid and who didn't.  Sometimes it was hard to tell who was the parent and who was the kid because some of the teens carried themselves like adults.  That night we were all truly exhausted.  I spent the night with a cabin full of 12 girls.  The next day I woke early to start breakfast for the group of about 30 people.  We made pancakes, sausage, put out oatmeal, and said the "Adam's Family Grace"... duh, nuh, nuh, nuh (snap, snap).  I supervised 3 girls as they operated the dish machine.  Others were playing a morning game to get the blood flowing for the day.  Afterward, we all met in a cramped circle to hold a planning meeting for the mentor/mentee program.  I initiated an icebreaker that didn't work so well because I had never seen it done.  We tried at it a while and decided to change the way it worked.  Everyone had a chance to get involved, and when the game was over I told the group why I was holding the meeting.  I really had no idea what the kids remembered about the program or whether they enjoyed it.  I told them that I would like to reinstitute the program and asked how many people would be interested in it.  A majority raised their hands to comply with continuation of the mentor/mentee program.  I asked the group why they thought Jameson Camp would have a program like this one, and one of the former campers (who is now a counselor or in training) gave an explanation about why having mentors is a valuable experience.  The group brainstormed about activities they could do with their mentors, and we wrote the ideas down on a large flip chart that the whole group could see.  The group was really quiet at first, but I got some really good ideas from them.  I think they are all excited to see what fun we can have.  The rest of the day Saturday centered around planning for the haunted house next Saturday, October 25 when Jameson Camp will host the Haunted Happening.  I am supervising a group of 4 kids as they morph one of the cabins into a "family-friendly" haunted house.  

Now it is Monday, and what a Monday it has been!  I arrived at 8:15 to start planning for the arrival of 40 FFA students from around the country.  Only 10 showed up.  We worked with them to transplant a bunch of "volunteers" or seedling trees to the other end of the campus.  This was really interesting because of the impact this will have on the future look and feel of Jameson Camp.  The environmental impact trees and shrubbery can have is amazing.  Good thing Chris was there today!  He was able to teach us all about the plants and wildlife involved in this "Day of Caring" brought to us by FFA.  The rest of the day was dedicated to more product-oriented things.   Tedious...

Week 7

Monday and Tuesday of this week were fun and exciting.  I got to pick out twelve pumpkins for kids to carve this weekend, have posters laminated, cut fabric for a banner project, and help facilitate the AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) Conference.  Every one of the activities went well for at least 3 of the 4 groups.  There were about 60 freshmen in 4 groups of 15.  The 30 seniors were spread amongst the freshmen leading in pairs or threes.  There was rumor of a "riot" in the Peace Center during the Labeling activity, but the seniors were able to recover.  The labeling activity required the group of 15 freshmen to "label" their foreheads with a sign saying "Braniac-agree with me" "Popular-pay attention to me" "Clown-laugh at me" but the kids in the riotous group were looking at their labels, so the activity was somewhat of a flop for them.  

I noticed a lot of the seniors were a little less than confident about leading groups, and some did much better than others as they were more prepared.  Discussion sessions could have been a little better.  The seniors didn't plan things to ask during debriefing time in a group I observed.  Some of the groups were unorganized and a little unenthusiastic at first, but the progression of the day brought more confidence.  Once the first activity was done, the seniors seemed to move on with the day without hesitation.  Everyone left knowing something they didn't know before whether it be about themselves, the camp, the 40 developmental assets, or the interactions between people.  

Since the leaders were only about 4 years older than the group members, the leaders were able to connect with a lot of the freshman.  Some of them ate lunch with freshmen they felt connected to, and the seniors paired up with freshmen that they plan to contact sometime between now and next year.  Overall, the program went really well.  

I had a lot of fun, plus I felt very useful to the seniors leading.  When one of the groups seemed to have a slow start, I began giving examples of questions they could ask to reflect on the purpose of the activity.  Some seniors in the staff lodge seemed to be getting frustrated because the whole group was spread out in a long building.  I had to ask them to come together a couple times as they were looking pretty segregated.  The leaders asked me a lot of great questions, and they felt good about what they were doing.  I had a lot of chances to ask them questions about how they got involved with the program and how they felt about leading freshmen.   The seniors also had some suggestions for next year.  Tim and I will follow up with the teachers, the seniors and Sh'nea who heads the AVID program sometime next week.  We also have evaluation forms that the students will fill out and return to us.  

Week 7

Monday was pretty uneventful. I looked for pumpkin patches online, budgeted for the banner project, got my documents in order for midterm evaluations, and sat in misery while my uterus tried to condense itself to the size of a cashew.
Wednesday morning was the last training session at Ben Davis. The seniors had a chance to visualize the day's activities for the AVID Conference hosted at Jameson Camp. They were grouped into the activities they will be leading between trainings (i.e. Asset Awareness, labeling activity, biography chairs, qualities and roles of a leader, etc). The seniors asked some important questions about their activities, and Tim and I got a real grasp for what additional supplies we need to provide for the seniors in order to have the conference run smoothly. Seniors will have 3 more days of class before the conference to practice the activities and plan for leading 60 freshman through a series of 7 activities within 5 hours. A few of the seniors seem to know their stuff, while others in the class seem like they might take a backseat. I'm really excited to see all the hard work pay off. The rest of the morning was spent shopping for things like folders, name tags, snacks for breaktime during the conference, fabric for my banner project, and other random necessities. The most random items came from our shopping experience at Goodwill. Staff at follow-ups will be handing out tickets rewarding youth leaders for showing positive attitudes and excellent leadership skills. They will use their tickets to enter themselves drawings for different prizes. The prizes will consist of Jameson Camp gear and the odd toys n' things we found at Goodwill. We have quite a collection.

Week 6

This week was wonderfully exciting!  Monday was the first day company employees of Nestle started bringing in their employees for low ropes team building courses.  This was also the day of a field visit that probably could have gone on all day when taking into consideration the enormous amount of fun activities going on at Jameson.  I had a meeting with Tim that took up a considerable amount of time Monday afternoon.  I began to feel stressed out thinking about everything that needed to get done that evening because of the heavy influx of assignments not only at Jameson, but in classes and other jobs.  We talked about the toy drive that will take place in December.  I will be helping families fill out applications for receiving toys and working on advertising to the families about the event.  Tim and I also went over the agenda for meeting with our AVID class at Ben Davis Wednesday morning.  We pulled out some of the materials we would need to take, and I made an outline of what I wanted to talk about with the seniors.  We printed the (hopefully) final edition of the AVID Conference schedule to hand out to the seniors, too (now I know what cardstock is...).   We spoke of improving a program  for mentors and mentees that has been attempted last year but needs expanding this year.  Tim wants me to look into improving it.  Monday was also the start for the design of an invitation to over 400 people inviting them to attend the Halloween Happening at the end of the month (which the youth leaders will plan-exciting!).  

Wednesday was exhausting.  I got to Jameson early to pick up the supplies and head to our AVID class at BD.  We did a complete review of all the activities the seniors will facilitate.  Plus, we gave them tips to help the day go smoothly.  Afterward, we got back to camp to set up the low ropes course, and this was all ready.  Jeremy, Tim, and I (all anticipating the facilitation of a low ropes course for about 50 people) hung out and waited for buses to arrive and the participants to get coffee and debriefing.  The low ropes went very well except for time constraints.  I had the privilege of leading an element called Trollies.  I had 3 groups of older workers who listened fairly well.  They were all open-minded about my crazy scenario.  I told them that there was a mosquito-spraying crew who spilled a large amount of extremely toxic repellant in an area so (I was wearing a pair of steel boots) I told them they had to have all 5 members (3 teams) move across the terrain with each of their feet on the two long boards under them.  They had to move in a circle around a cone.  Some groups were too fast.  A few overly ambitious people had strange and wonderful things happen in the story to cause them to lose sight or voices.  Other teams had to turn around or go backward.  This was simply a blast.

The afternoon consisted of planning out what food will be used from the leftover stock of kitchen goods when we go to host the first Follow-up.  Tim and I planned a snack, breakfast, and a lunch.  When we were done there, we printed out 400 invitations, started labeling them and called it a day.