Posts Tagged ‘Aloha Camps’
By alohafoundation
Sunday, January 1st, 2012
As we ring in 2012, Aloha bids farewell to two people who, as much as anyone over the past quarter-century, have embodied The Aloha Foundation’s spirit and traditions. Deb and Andy Williams, who ran Hulbert Outdoor Center for two decades and Ohana Family Camp for the past six years — are retiring. They’ve introduced hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people to the Aloha experience during their time here, and broadened that experience to include people of all ages.
On a still-warm day in December, they sat in the sunroom of their Norwich, Vermont home and reflected on their own Aloha experience. Not surprisingly, they talked a lot about their work at Ohana, the family camp they helped build over the past decade.
“One has very few opportunities in a career to start something from scratch,” said Andy. (more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, fairlee, family camp, leadership, Ohana, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Camp News | 5 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Monday, December 12th, 2011
Imagine if Hogwarts had a day camp for aspiring young wizards. That thought wasn’t too far a stretch one afternoon this past summer at Horizons. It was “choice” period at Horizons, the only non-residential camp of The Aloha Foundation. On a broad grassy playing field, Chipmunks to Falcons — campers ranging in age from kindergarten graduates to nearly-out-of-middle-schoolers — were preparing for an important match. They wriggled into green or yellow pinneys and chose carefully among a pile of brightly colored swim noodles. Some of the children taped big letters — B, C, K — to their pinneys. At the ends of the playing field, three tall wooden stakes held hula hoops aloft — yellow, pale green, and, higher than the other two, pink. Together, the stakes and the upended hoops looked like enormous bubble wands — but were actually goals for the quaffle. The lettered pinneys stood for Bludgers, Chasers and Keepers. And the field was set for an all-out, campers against counselors, game of Quidditch. (more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Camp, camps, Childhood, Fun, Horizons, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Camp News, Child Development | No Comments »
By alohafoundation
Monday, September 5th, 2011
Each day at Hive is filled with adventures AND hugs
“Who sends a seven year-old to camp?”
I start with this question because I got it a lot when I made the decision to send my daughter for her Elfin summer — and I repeatedly asked it of myself when I was packing her trunk. “Who sends a seven year-old off to camp?”
But the decision to do it was actually very easy: my daughter has always had a daring spirit and when she heard that there were places for kids to go adventuring by themselves away from their families, she was thrilled. My husband and I could have said, “No, wait until you are older,” but we wanted to encourage her. We were frank with her about the challenges — yes, she would probably have moments of wanting to go home. That was normal. How was she going to handle it? we asked. She would talk to her counselor, she said, and find something to keep her busy. Good plan, we said. At worst, we told her, you’ll have ten days that were harder than you expected but you will come home proud that you tried something new.
(more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Aloha Hive, Camp, Child Development, empowerment, fairlee, girls, lake fairlee, self-confidence, self-esteem, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Camp Philosophy, Child Development, Success Counseling | 4 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Monday, August 22nd, 2011
The challenge to get to the top is physical and mental
One morning late last spring, 30 eighth-graders from Claremont, New Hampshire, walked off a school bus at Hulbert Outdoor Center. They’d heard about this day from students who’d graduated before them at Claremont Middle School. They’d heard their teacher, Jessica Warkentien, call it “a culminating experience.” Her phrase captured the day’s double purpose — both a celebration of the end of middle school and a series of challenges that would test the students in new and perhaps surprising ways.
They followed a wide path from the bus into the woods, where five instructors trained in experiential education were waiting to guide the students through a ropes course. With the help of the Hulbert staff, the young teenagers ambling up the path would learn — perhaps discover — how they assessed risk and limits, how they performed under pressure, how they gave and received support from others. (more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, boys, girls, Horizons, self-confidence, self-esteem, trust
Posted in Camp News, Camp Philosophy, Child Development | 1 Comment »
By alohafoundation
Friday, July 22nd, 2011
Director Downey watches Friday night's performance.
Anne Downey, Department Head of Aloha’s Performing Arts Department, had just called a short break from rehearsals for this year’s show, “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,” and the Hale, Aloha’s music building was quiet and almost empty. In two days, families and friends would arrive for Show Weekend and the back-to-back musical performances that have become a much anticipated and grand Aloha tradition. Downey gave the confident, matter-of-fact sense that she’d been through this nervous period before and that this year’s cast would be just fine. Still, she was now counting the remaining preparation in hours.
Some girls shuffled off to the main building to refill water bottles. Others retreated to shade under trees or on the porch. A heat wave was cresting over New England, spreading even as far north as Fairlee. Every door in the building stood wide open to welcome small gusts coming off Lake Morey or slight forest breezes. Downey waved her copy of the script like a thick fan and explained that after the break, the cast would do a complete run-through of the show. “We want them to see what they can do,” Downey said. “We have girls on lights, backstage, on stage. This is big-girl camp. Every girl plays an important role.” (more…)
Tags: Aloha, Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Camp, girls, self-confidence, self-esteem, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Camp News, Camp Philosophy | No Comments »
By alohafoundation
Wednesday, July 20th, 2011
Beginners get one-on-one coaching on the Aloha crew dock
Aloha Camp was in full summer swing last week, one perfect day following another. On Tuesday afternoon, the sun beamed down full, adding sparkle to Lake Morey’s brilliant blue. Four campers walked down to the lake past the ARC (Aloha Rowing Club), where Aloha Crew counselors Emma and Arielle waited for them on a short dock.
Among the colorful beach towels draped over dock posts and the boisterous splashing of swimmers, the girls gathered around a sleek, gray, metal rowing machine. Harper settled into its sliding seat. The rowing machine, a Concept 2 ergometer, mimics the action of rowing. Olympic and collegiate crews train on Concept 2 ergometers year-round. While other campers watched, Arielle talked Harper through the sequence. Harper grasped a handle connected to a coiled chain inside the flywheel of the “erg” and pushed her hands away from her body — “as if they’re going across a little tabletop and then coming back underneath it,” said Arielle, impressing upon Harper the importance of keeping her hands level. “We don’t want any divots in the table.” Next Harper leaned her upper body forward, maintaining the extension of her arms. Finally, Arielle asked Harper to add legs to the sequence. The camper slid all the way to the front of her slide until her body was tightly compressed at what rowers call “the catch.” On Arielle’s command, Harper uncoiled in the reverse sequence, pushing down her legs, unfolding her back, and pulling her arms and the handle in above her waist. The flywheel whirred. (more…)
Tags: Aloha, Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Child Development, fairlee, girls, morey, self-confidence, self-esteem, Success Counseling, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Camp News, Child Development, Success Counseling | 3 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Saturday, May 7th, 2011
Children gain immense self-esteem conquering challenges outdoors
Richard Louv is back, and this time, he’s telling us that not only should children be spending more time in the woods, but that his advice goes for plugged-in adults too. That means you, reading this post on your laptop, and for me as well, writing inside on a beautiful spring day in Vermont. The bestselling author of 2005′s Last Child in the Woods has written The Nature Principle: Human Restoration and the End of Nature-Deficit Disorder, which will be in bookstores on May 10th. Like his previous book, The Nature Principle is likely to make a big splash in the media, and in our collective consciousness, as Louv argues that the success of future generations will belong not to people who focus solely on technology and the digital world, nor to those who eschew the progress made by technological advances and improvements, but to those who Louv would claim, have a “hybrid mind,” able to enjoy and harness the powers of both worlds. (more…)
Tags: Aloha, Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Aloha Hive, Camp, camps, Hulbert Outdoor Center, Lanakila, nature, Ohana, self-confidence, self-esteem, Vermont
Posted in Camp Philosophy, Child Development, Children and Technology | 2 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Monday, April 4th, 2011
Summer allows plenty of unstructured playtime for children.
In 2009, Vicky Abeles’ 13-year-old middle school daughter, Jamey, began to complain of stomach aches after school. A Bay-area lawyer and mother with three children, Abeles began to question whether the pace set by her children’s school schedules, homework, sports and extracurricular activities was a negative factor in Jamey’s health. Although not a filmmaker, Abeles ambitiously set off with a camera to explore the correlation between the health and happiness of today’s middle and high school students, and the competitive, success-driven curricula of America’s public schools. The result, Race to Nowhere, is a striking examination of America’s current public schools model, a standards-based curriculum promoting future successful members of the American workforce. Specifically, the film critiques the effect on teaching of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, which mandates levels of achievement in order for states to be eligible for federal funding. In other words, there is a world of exciting knowledge out there, but teachers are expected to “teach to the test.” (more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Child Development, Childhood, education, summer camp, Vermont
Posted in Child Development, Child Psychology, Success Counseling | 3 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Thursday, March 10th, 2011
Although it is possible to connect virtually, close, authentic relationships evolve slowly, and in person.
“Facebook ruined our trip!” It was Day 18 of a 45-day wilderness journey through Alaska’s Brooks Range, and it had been raining steadily for days. The group of young women, irritable, soaked to the skin, and their two instructors had stopped for one of the myriad decisions on such a trip — what route to follow, when to stop, where to set up camp, what to cook, who leads, who follows — when 17-year-old Mallory Brooks burst out with her cry of complaint.
Like the other girls standing in the rain, Mallory considered the trip a rite of passage, the culmination of many years of preparation. That preparation had begun at the camp they’d all attended in Wisconsin, where Mallory had spent seven summers. Many campers chose to go on expedition trips before they returned to the camp on staff. Mallory had been looking forward to the Alaska trip ever since she’d returned from a 28-day backpacking trip through the Wind Rivers the year before. (more…)
Tags: Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Bruce tuckman, facebook, girls, girls' confidence, Hulbert, transformation, wilderness, Young Women's Leadership Expedition
Posted in Camp News, Camp Philosophy, Child Development | 2 Comments »
By alohafoundation
Saturday, February 5th, 2011
Lanakila campers are never far from gentle guidance, but are encouraged to look within for solutions.
In the last few weeks, much of the blogosphere was reacting, possibly over-reacting to the debut of Amy Chua’s book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, featured in an article in the Wall Street Journal. If you somehow managed to miss the uproar, Chua’s book is subtitled, “This is a story about a mother, two daughters, and two dogs. This was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better at raising kids than Western ones. But instead, it’s about a bitter clash of cultures, a fleeting taste of glory, and how I was humbled by a thirteen-year-old.” More than a parenting manual, Battle Hymn is a memoir of Chua’s life as a Chinese-American mother, married to a non-Chinese husband, managing their family’s child rearing according to traditional, and strict, Chinese methods. Among the rules imposed upon Chua’s daughters were the following no-no’s:
- attend a sleepover
- have a playdate
- be in a school play
- complain about not being in a school play
- watch TV or play computer games
- choose their own extracurricular activities
- get any grade less than an A
- not be the No. 1 student in every subject except gym and drama
- play any instrument other than the piano or violin
- not play the piano or violin. (more…)
Tags: adult-child relations, Aloha, Aloha Camps, Aloha Foundation, Aloha Hive, Child Development, Horizons Day Camp, Hulbert Outdoor Center, Vermont
Posted in Child Development | 2 Comments »
As we ring in 2012, Aloha bids farewell to two people who, as much as anyone over the past quarter-century, have embodied The Aloha Foundation’s spirit and traditions. Deb and Andy Williams, who ran Hulbert Outdoor Center for two decades and Ohana Family Camp for the past six years — are retiring. They’ve introduced hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people to the Aloha experience during their time here, and broadened that experience to include people of all ages.
