It's doesn't happen often during summer camps, but when it does, a good volunteer can be the one to bring that child back into the fray, or at least into the fun.
Callum Glass, 17, and Ava Thompson, 13, are two of the approximately 65 volunteers scheduled to help make North Vancouver camps a little brighter and a little better this summer.
"I did the summer camps when I was a little kid and I always thought the leaders and volunteers were pretty awesome people," says Glass. "I just think it was really cool that I got to hang out with the older people when I was a little. They were kind of role models to me."
Motivated by the prospect of having fun and gaining work experience at the same time, Glass has volunteered for the last four years. Before volunteering he attended a seminar to learn how to run activities and handle difficult situations.
"They basically told me how to be a role model. They helped me build my confidence," he says.
That seminar was useful for Thompson, but she says nothing can replicate the experience of actually being in camp with the kids.
"Each kid is different so until you have an experience you can't really be taught how to deal exactly with certain scenarios. You can't be taught what each leader would like. Each camp is different. Two are never the same even if it's the same theme. They always go differently," she says. "The more you do the easier it becomes because you know what to expect."
For Thompson, helping out with day camps and birthdays are usually the most rewarding.
"I like the ones where you play a whole bunch of games for about an hour and then you play freeze dance. It's so funny to just watch them dancing," she says.
Both Glass and Thompson have learned how to defuse difficult situations and keep the camp running smoothly.
"If it's them being tired typically you'll ask them if they need food," says Thompson. "If it's between two people you just have to offer them more things to do versus playing with each other. That's one of the things we learned in the volunteer course, which I enjoyed as well because we just learned so much about how to deal with different experiences."
When it comes to dealing with older campers, Glass says it's key to offer variety.
"They can't do the same activities as the younger ones because they're older and they get bored of it pretty fast," he says. "Sometimes the older kids get tired of something and they'll want to do something else so you have to adapt."
In the rare case of a child on the sidelines, Glass says he'll always try to get them involved with something.
"If I see someone by themselves I always try to go over and play with them," he says.
"I haven't seen it that often but there's the rare case where someone's just sitting on the side doing nothing and they don't want to do anything. You have to go over there and try to get them to do something because it's a waste of their day if they're not having fun, so you want to help them."
