Kids are always on-the-go throughout the school year with sports, after-school programs, homework, and other activities. Then that stops, abruptly, when summer begins. So what should they do to fill their summertime?
The school break is full of potential and you don’t want your kids to waste it away by sitting inside all day in front of their screens. Perhaps it’s worth considering finding a cool summer camp for kids to spend some of their time. They can beat the heat and enhance their overall summer experience at some fun summer camps while you get some time to do whatever you need to do. The bottom line is that summer camps have so many benefits for both you and your kids, which is what should really matter— beyond just those that seem “cool”.
What Cool Summer Camps Really Offer Your Child
Endless Things To Do
At summer camp, your kids will be entertained from sunrise to beyond sunset. Even the pickiest of campers will be able to find something they love, in fact, they might even have a hard time choosing among all the great activities.
Having so many different activities allows your child to find what they like and even enhance skills they never knew they had.
Meet People from Different Places
Perhaps your children’s friends are all going on family vacations or staying with grandma so your little ones are left alone with nothing to do and nobody to play with. At the best kinds of summer camps, your kids will make new friends from all over the world that they can share fond memories with. Hopefully, the camp will give them something/someone to look forward to seeing every summer.
Nowadays, the concept of pen-pals may seem outdated, but it’s actually just different with the accessibility of the internet. With modern technology, your child might find a long-distance friend that they can keep in touch with throughout the year. These new bonds with people from different backgrounds can provide a broader outlook on life.
Disconnect From Tech – Curb the Addiction
One of the coolest things about a summer camp is the break from digital. Now, we know, everybody has an attachment to technology, and a break from that can be difficult. But, breaks can break bad tech tendencies and potentially stunt developing addictions to gaming, social media, or video binging.
Many summer camps now, or the more experiential, activity-based camps, require that kids and teens completely disconnect from screens to allow them to experience the full emersion of camp. If you’re worried about communicating with your camper, cast that aside. Some camps offer Hybrid communication which is a great option to get a message to your kid. Hybrid is a physical-to-digital mode of messaging perfect for campers to parents. Campers write home, their letter is scanned and emailed right to their parents. This allows parents to write back immediately to their kid which removes the waiting period that comes with traditional snail mail.
Learn How to Stay in Touch with Your Child While at Camp
Create Memories
Summer camp is a once-in-a-lifetime experience your kid is sure to remember for the rest of their life. It’s the thing they will talk about with their friends when they return to school. It will be the thing they look forward to until they’re too old to go back.
Find New Talents and Hobbies
A cool summer camp will offer activities that excite all kinds of campers— arts, crafts, sports, games, hiking, biking, boating, water activities, etc! Campers are sure to find something new that they love. Counselors will help your child learn and experience new activities that they can continue to improve year after year. And while it’s great when camps offer activities that your child already enjoys, the best summer camps will have something new, too!
And who knows, maybe they’ll find something they love so much they’ll continue to do it beyond summer camp.
Check out Cool Camp Activities
Build Confidence, Develop Independence
If your child is shy, finding a cool summer camp for them to return to year after year can be a great way to get them out of their shell.
On the other hand, if you’ve got an energetic kid, summer camp is a wonderful place for them to release that energy and put it into learning a new skill or finding a new hobby. Learning new skills helps your child feel more confident in themselves and allows them to show off their new talents.
Counselors are there to help campers as much as they can, but they also encourage the kids to perform tasks on their own to increase confidence in themselves and build a stronger sense of independence and an ‘I can do it’ attitude.
Learn to Get Along With Others — Become a Leader
When you send your kid to the right summer camp, they will learn how to work with a team. As a child learns to embrace a new cabin family and try new activities with new friends, they naturally build social skills to communicate with a group and develop strong listening skills.
Cool summer camps focus on how to allow kids to become leaders. Different activities provide campers with opportunities to lead and give instructions. Counselors provide a constructed and healthy environment for campers to learn from trial and error on what will and won’t work in a leadership role.
Learn about the Camp Jeanne d’Arc Mission
From the Parent Perspective: You Get You Time
Nine months out of the year are equally as go go go for the parents as they are for the children. You ensure that they’re properly fed, getting enough sleep, and are where they need to be when they need to be there, whether that means sporting events, school recitals, lessons, or clubs. You’re the homework helper, the store-running specialist, the encouraging all-things educator, and the monumental memory-maker.
We know that finding cool activities for your kids can be difficult in the summer, and it can leave you feeling exhausted. Experiential summer camps allow you to take some time off from planning your children’s summer so that you get to do a little bit of relaxing.
So, what makes cool summer camps “cool”?
Kids look forward to something fun to do in the summertime. We can’t always arrange to take a full-on family vacation, but we want something planned for our child to help reduce boredom and cabin fever. What more could a kid ask for than a fun-filled summer camp experience? Camp will give your kid something to look forward to and something to talk about after it’s all done. It doesn’t get much better than delicious food, great activities, lifelong friends, increased confidence, and so much more.
There are so many different cool summer camps to choose from. However, if your daughter is looking for the most memorable and fun camp around, and you are looking for a camp that will help her develop into a strong young woman, check out Camp Jeanne d’Arc. She’ll be able to enjoy her incredible camp experience on Chateaugay Lake in Upstate New York, gazing out at the Adirondack mountains and learning how to develop her talents and cultivate her confidence. At Camp Jeanne d’Arc, we have spent decades optimizing that “cool summer camp” experience to ensure each of our campers are begging to come back year after year!