It’s rather apropos that this camp came after the last one. While I spent time teaching La Niña about bad behaviours and the impact that insecurities have on people, this camp only reinforced these messages with their i-imagine, i-can, i-do philosophy.
Behaviours that stop people from reaching their potential are seen as roadblocks, stopped, and creative thinking is used to help kids solve problems. In a lot of ways, this camp felt similar to how leaders in the design-driven development world approach feature development. I’m sure there’s a connection there.
The transformation in La Niña was amazing. She went from being morose and unsure to being unendingly chatty, happy and philosophical about her experiences. She said she felt listened to, respected, and important… like her ideas mattered (because they do). Below are her words (the poet pops out briefly):
The camp is much better than the other one because it’s not boring and if it was boring than they (Imagineerez) would do something about it. This camp is very artistic and has lots of good kids there. We built a spy hideout that’s definitely not a spy hideout. They have 4 parks and the grass grows freely in the field. The trees are very tall but best of all the councillors are very nice. Every so often just before lunch, we play a very fun game. Here I just got to play and play and play. At the other camp, they tried to control everything and I just wanted to be a kid. The End.
And, to further my point… these little snippets of wisdom were vocalized by La Niña during a brainstorming session and then written down. Not bad for a troublemaker bright little girl.
