Your Kid Needs Outdoor Summer Camp to Understand You and Others

Summer away camps are a unique experience for kids to make new friends, learn new skills, and become more confident and independent. They can also provide kids with a new outlook on life, society, and the world at large. More and more, experts are discussing and agreeing upon the many ways that outdoor summer camps can help kids better understand themselves, their families, and people in general. How does this happen? Consider the following:

Distance offers perspective

Time spent away from the daily routine and pressures of family and friends offers kids time to reflect on those relationships. We are all often so busy – kids included – that we exist in a rut. There is little time for reflection and also not a lot of space to weigh and compare our experiences. Camp offers kids the time and space to re-think interpersonal relationships and re-examine concepts of friendship, teamwork, respect, authority, and more. How do their camp friends treat them, when compared to their at-home friends? How do adults treat them? Are expectations for chores, behavior, etc different at camp and at home? How are we different? Kids themselves may be aware that they are acting differently at camp than they would at home.

Understanding others requires self-awareness

We can become so worn in our patterns of behavior that we don’t even realize that there are other options. Summer camp offers kids the opportunity to look up and consider other modes of being, not only in others but in themselves. Working together on common goals also creates a bond and shared experience that promotes empathy and mutual understanding.

Recognizing differences help us to understand others and ourselves

Self-awareness is a life skill that many adults struggle with and for a kid to be able to learn this, is a valuable lesson indeed! The opportunity to live with kids from diverse ethnic, religious, and social backgrounds, and interact with friends and counselors who are in “near-peer” age groups is an opportunity that is not often experienced in at-home daily life. It can be hard for kids to individuate and become self-aware in an environment that is overly familiar socially, and routine. In order to be truly aware of ourselves, it is necessary to be aware of others. Summer camp offers up that challenge in a safe and supervised fashion, offering kids the chance to “find themselves” and appreciate each other and each other’s differences.

Catalina Island Camps: an outdoor summer camp in California

Learning to get along in diverse groups is a valuable life skill, perhaps one of the greatest and longest-lasting gifts your child can receive from a California outdoor summer camp like Catalina Island Camps. Learn about who we are at Catalina Island Camps and browse our summer camp and camp leadership program opportunities! Catalina Island Camps may be the perfect place for your child to spend the summer.