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Last weekend we had the soccer camp which I already participating in for about 7 years. We'd go to a camp-farm every year.
The camp is always fun for kids, the are entertained by playing all kinds of games like (of course) soccer, animal sounds game, dropping (in the woods) and many many more, and of course big pillow fights. Normally we are with about 100 persons (including the crew), this year there were a little less kids then previous years but still it was a great group.
on every team of kids there are two supervisors which lead the team and acompany them to the games. And every year they (the supervisors) are ventilating their problems with us (in the kitchen) when they come by for a drink or so. Often they talk about kids who are difficult to handle, rude or even violent. The difficult part in those conversations for me is to be objective and understanding. I mean, it is easy to say that a kid is bad, not social or something else but I always want to give the benefit of the doubt. I mean, a kid isn't bad of it's own (with badmouthing or something like that) he is teached (or lack of teaching) to be like that and often they don't even mean the things they do. Sometimes it is attention or just frustration.
Although I know that my own kids aren't sweathearts all the time I do know (and trust them for it) that they would never badmouth against adults for one or swear with awfull diseases, that is part of the upbringing I guess, and that is just the point I make to the supervisors. It is utopia for us to correct kids in a weekend, they are there for having a lot of fun, to be away from their routines etc. So we have to accept that some kids do have a manual, we only have to steer a bit in the right direction and won't tollerate misbehaviour with things that arent acceptable. What I did see is that certain kids (with behave problems) turned around totally if they just get the right attention. I always look for the best in kids and try to put that in front. And often it works.
So what I want to achieve with this post is:
Have a awesome day,
Peter
