Tour Day is one of my favourite days at camp because I get to meet with all the cabins to talk about social and emotional safety at camp.
Much of what I do as camp director is taken from my mom, former director Joanne Kates, who forged Arowhon’s reputation as a leader in anti-bullying and social safety, and the meetings today are no exception. I remember being a counsellor myself, bringing my campers through the same cabin I live in now, and having the same discussion, almost word for word, as I had 30 times today.
First we talk about how great it is to get to have sleepovers every night with a group kids who become like best friends and siblings to you, and how, along with that, comes some inevitable conflict and challenges. Then we discuss how we can’t help getting annoyed by people, but we CAN help what we do when that happens. I ask the kids to tell me what they think are some poor ways to deal with it when they’re annoyed with cabin mates (violence, yelling, retaliation, etc.), and then get them to brainstorm and commit to more productive ways to deal with their frustration toward others.
The answers aren’t groundbreaking (“tell them to stop,” “walk away, “tell a counsellor”), but it sets the stage for our culture of communication about what’s going on in groups and interpersonally. That way, when conflicts do come up, we refer back to this conversation and ask them to compare and contrast their commitments to their actions, and decide which should be adjusted.
Thus is the basis of the Arowhon Social Safety Toolkit: Collaborative Problem Solving. We don’t tell kids what to do. Instead, we help them come up with solutions to the challenges they are encountering so they can learn the skills to navigate these situations when we’re not around, at camp and beyond.
