Not So Much—Part 2

Eight powerful practices that directors don’t do

By Chris Thurber
Photos: Prep4Camp

In Part 1 of this series, I noted respect for different camps’ styles and catalogued the first half of my commonly rejected suggestions for program improvement. Here, in Part 2, I will outline four more best practices, explain the push-back offered by some camp owners and directors, and summarize compelling reasons to overcome these obstacles in order to achieve more desired outcomes.

1. Add pre-learning to on-site training.
In 2005, I was enjoying a car ride to the airport from the owner/director of a longtime camp client, Rob Hammond. Hammond, who owns and directs Camp Laney in Mentone, Ala., praised the two-and-a-half days of workshops I had done with his staff members, but I wondered what else they still needed before opening day. “It’s a long list,” he said, “too much to cover, even if you were able to be here for a week.” I kept listening. “You’d have to get to everybody on-site for twice the time, but they’re all still in school.” Thus was planted the seed for what became ExpertOnlineTraining.com or EOT.

Thanks to a website built by two other friends, Evan Heltay and Hagai Maidenberg, we began offering annual subscriptions to a library of instructional videos. Because each video is followed by a quiz, directors can track their staff’s learning and document it for accreditation. And for in-season reference, directors can download the PDF handouts that accompany each video and quiz combo, and add them to their staff-training manual. No longer do directors feel a time crunch during their on-site training.

Pre-learning, sometimes called “pre-arrival training,” is a complement to—not a substitute for—on-site training. Nothing can ever take the place of on-site training, but Expert Online Training adds these unique advantages to a total training curriculum:

• The rate of significant accidents and injuries will decrease, thanks to better-trained staff members who can spot risks, teach good behavior, and interact safely with children. In fact, the accident/injury data comparing EOT subscribers to non-EOT subscribers were so compelling that many insurance companies began offering credits to their clients.

• If 70 percent or more of your staff members complete an EOT Safer Summers course, many insurance companies can apply a discount to your renewal policy. In almost all cases, camps enjoy a savings that matches or surpasses the cost of the EOT subscription. In other words, EOT pays for itself at the same time it boosts your staff members’ stamina and good decision-making.

• You can assign courses that help meet certain accreditation standards that you once had to skim or completely skip, due to time constraints.

• You can go into depth on key topics during on-site training because staff members will have arrived with stronger basic and intermediate skills.

• You will notice how staff members arrive for on-site training with a professional mindset, having spent time learning about the magnitude and complexity of their responsibilities.

Because nothing is more important to a program than the quality of relationships between adult leaders and the young people they serve, it is impossible to overstate the importance of a well-trained staff. Yet pre-learning—be it EOT or another source—gets perennial push-back. Owners and directors worry about the expense and the time.

To the expense concern, I ask owners and directors to think about the monetary and reputational costs of an accident or injury or lawsuit. With the credit program some insurance companies have put in place, no program can object to the price of an annual subscription; although no form of education can prevent all accidents and injuries, it is common sense that a thoroughly trained staff will perform better and make wiser choices.

As for time, the average high-school or college student spends between four and eight hours online each day. Wouldn’t you rather have that student spend some of that time preparing for a summer job?

For any staff members who protest they do not have time to open an app and watch some videos, what they are really saying is they lack a professional commitment to the work you have hired them to do. If you identify an online-learning slacker, let that person go now, while it’s easy. Then hire a replacement who demonstrates stamina and commitment, right out of the blocks.

2. Teach campers—not only staff members—about adult-child boundaries.
Anyone reading this article knows the importance of training staff members on the parameters of safe touch, safe talk, appropriate boundaries, and mandated reporting of suspected abuse and neglect. However, very few summer youth programs extend that responsibility to families. I have long suggested that owners and directors lead the charge in educating parents and other caregivers on how to talk with kids about abuse prevention.

The push-back is obvious: Few owners and directors are comfortable broaching the topics of abuse prevention and appropriate boundaries with campers and their families. The risk is that parents might misconstrue this proactive communication as narrowly directed at camp. Certainly, many directors have said to me, “I get the logic of helping parents coach their children to stay safe. But if the message comes from camp, parents will think the problem originates with camp.” I understand that concern. It would make any owner or director anxious.

Proper framing of the message is the solution. I suggest something like this:

At [__program name__] we are especially proud of the close and healthy relationships that are formed between our young participants and our professional staff. As part of our commitment to physical and emotional safety, we select our staff members from a large pool of applicants, we interview each person carefully, we pass each through a national criminal background check, and we insist that each has three glowing references, which we personally check.

As part of our commitment to the highest quality leadership and mentoring, each of our staff members—new and returning—participates in a combination of online and on-site training before your child arrives. Some of that training explains the parameters of safe touch, safe talk, and appropriate adult-child boundaries. For a holistic approach to interpersonal safety, our on-site camper orientation also includes an explanation of what constitutes appropriate touch (e.g., a high-five), how to ask for consent (e.g., before giving a hug), and how to express safety concerns to a trusted adult.

We believe that you, the parents or primary caregivers of your child, are our partners in youth development. Therefore, we recommend that you, too, have an updated and age-appropriate conversation with your child about safe touch, safe talk, and appropriate adult-child boundaries. Many parents feel more prepared for such important conversations after reviewing the guidance provided in reputable books and websites, such as that of the American Academy of Pediatrics. If we can provide personal guidance in this or any other area of pre-camp preparation, please write or call us. Thank you!

You can undoubtedly refine this wording to suit your audience. The point is to encourage parents to collaborate with you in keeping their child safe. Mistreatment of a child by an adult or by another child is never the survivor’s fault. Nevertheless, children themselves can often thwart the beginnings of inappropriate behavior by knowing what to look for, how to be assertive, and what to tell a trusted adult.

As a result of the shared effort to nurture healthy relationships between staff members—who are serving as surrogate caregivers—and the young people they serve, a camp will be even safer.

3. Discipline by teaching, not by punishing.
Punishing misbehavior, or what is euphemistically called “providing a consequence,” will teach most children what not to do. But durable behavior change (the kind where you don’t hear yourself saying, “How many times do I have to tell you?” and “What did I just say?”) require that you teach children what to do. In other words, you have to teach positive alternate behavior.

When I recommend adopting this approach to discipline, the push-back comes in two forms:

(a) Teaching positive alternate behavior takes too long.

(b) Teaching positive alternate behavior is too soft.

Here is how I address these legitimate concerns.

An easy example to use from any day camp, overnight camp, or parks and rec program begins with the common rule, “No running in the dining hall.” The floors can be wet and slippery, the space is crowded during service, and the chance of crashes and spills increases with speed.

If you teach staff members to punish such misbehavior, then they might do any of the following:

• Yell at campers for running.

• Lecture campers about why running is against the rules in the dining hall.

• Remove a privilege, such as dessert or movie night or late lights.

• Add a work duty, such as stacking wood or scrubbing boat hulls.

• Impose a social consequence, such as having a time out.

What all of these punishments lack is any practice walking, which, after all, is the target behavior. A more durable solution is for a staff member to halt the running, calmly but firmly, perhaps by holding up a hand. Then, the staff member can gather the group together and calmly state, “I know you are all smart enough to remember the rule about walking in the dining hall. But the way we came in just now tells me that many of you have forgotten why walking in the dining hall matters. Can someone say why?”

After someone explains the rationale (kids almost always know why certain rules exist), it’s time to practice positive alternate behavior. This step cements learning and helps kids resist the temptation to run at the next meal. The leader simply says, “Good. Let’s take just a minute and go back outside, line up like we did before, and then walk to our table, like I know you can.”

This kind of “rehearse and redo” approach to discipline is much closer to the Latin root of the word “discipline,” which means “to teach.” Yes, lining up again and walking into the dining hall takes more time at the moment compared to a simple punishment, but it saves lots of time over the course of a week by eliminating the need for repetition. By training staff members to teach children and teens positive alternate behaviors, you will save them time, endow them with a valuable leadership skill, and give them the gift of full-season stamina. (Nothing contributes more to burn-out than having to bark the same orders without getting a reliable response from the troops.)

The winning outcomes of effective discipline are the twin trophies of good behavior and a sense of accomplishment for both staff members and participants. Among the most common compliments I receive from staff members who have completed my live workshop or the EOT video set on Skillful Discipline is, “Chris, thank you for teaching me how to manage behavior without yelling!”

4. Protect time for unstructured, free play.
Children around the world are over-scheduled and over-packaged. They need time to make up games, get dirty, and figure things out for themselves. Adults—including camp staff members—do not need to orchestrate every moment of the day. And although these statements might have intuitive logic and emotional appeal, a glance at most camp websites reveals a daily schedule devoid of free time.

The push-back on my suggestion to protect time each day for unstructured play usually hinges on marketing. Owners and directors argue that prospective camp parents might pass on any program with “holes” in the schedule, perhaps thinking that tightly scheduling a plethora of activities is a mark of quality.

The reality is that our brains need to explore, unfettered by someone else’s ideas about what we need to learn and do. Exploration—physical, cognitive, and emotional—is the basis of learning. Moreover, young brains are pre-wired to be less-inhibited, precisely to encourage healthy exploration. As if children’s natural instincts to make up games, take things apart, overturn stones, wander, and wonder were not obvious enough, there is also decades of research on unstructured, child-directed play that clearly demonstrates how such activity boosts intelligence, creativity, problem-solving, and mood.

Any youth program interested in turning out authentically happy kids with inspired minds will overcome the fear of caregivers questioning why “free play” or “free time” is part of the schedule. Better yet, you can anticipate the question and provide a developmentally and scientifically valid rationale, right there on your website.

A few academically-minded parents may need you to make the comparison to the vaunted Makers’ Space that has popped up in most schools. The only difference is that, at camp, most of the property is a makers’ space. Oh, and remind every parent that “unstructured” does not mean “unsupervised.” Although kids will be directing the play, responsible adults will be keeping an eye on things to ensure participant safety.

I end with the challenge with which I began: Consider these eight frequently rebuffed suggestions, discuss them with your colleagues, and make a plan to adopt some. I guarantee that parents, campers, and staff members will thank you for taking a great program and making it even better.

Dr. Chris Thurber is a psychologist and professional educator at Phillips Exeter Academy who enjoys training other leaders and teachers around the world. He is the co-author of The Summer Camp Handbook and the co-founder of ExpertOnlineTraining.com, a collection of video training modules for youth leaders. To book a live training, enroll your staff in online learning, or read more about youth development, visit DrChrisThurber.com.