ACA Home Forums Count Down 2010!!

I can't believe Cedarledge has less than a month to go. Only 25 more days for me!

40 and 53! YAY!! Getting closer to 1 month! I will be home in less than 6 weeks which means classes will be done with as well!!!!!

I start the 17th

17 days until I report for ropes training. 1 more week until the semester is done and I can then start getting stuff together for the summer

25 days!! and school's already out!

18 days! I just need to get a few more things, and I'm ready!

38 and 51!!!!!! YAY!! 1 month 4 days until school is over, then a few more days until OE (38 from now) and then a few more until summer camp (51 from now!!!)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

whats oe?

41 days! I am so psyched! My camp director just emailed all of the group leaders each others' info so we could chat!

OE - is outdoor education - it is like camp but not!

Exactly what Smudge said! It's where the 5th or 6th grade classes can come for a 3 day/2 night camp with their teachers and parent chaperones. They learn things like forest, wildlife, and wetland ecology, canoeing, climbing wall, etc. We also do night hike and campfire as evening activities. At least that's how it works at my camp though every camp is at least a little different. It's a lot of fun! The parents are the "general counselors" and we are the activity instructors/teachers and lead things like meals.

That's awesome that you guys get a chance to chat before camp! Become friends, or at least aquanited and hopefully at least one of them has been to that camp and maybe even been a GL before!

OE is a lot of fun and what I like about it is, the pay is better (at least for us it is) and its less work. Most of our groups are 5th and 6th grade classes but there are occasions where the class is younger or older. We also do retreats and stuff, so we get a lot of religious groups and many other different type of groups as well.

Speaking of OE though, we're just at the beginning of our OE schedule still and early on our OE schedule is broken up a little bit. For example, my first week I had two days of work and then I got four days off. Then last week I worked 6 days and been off 3 days. I'm off until the middle of next week, and then our OE schedule picks up big time. I feel exhausted already and we haven't even gotten into the hard part of the schedule yet. Not to mention when the summer comes, the work increases a ton then. Its starting to worry me a little bit how tired I've been but maybe its just me getting back into the swing of things....

You should see me at precamp, DTP! I'm bouncing off the trees but exaughsted. I'm so excited to be there but since I don't do any exercising (mostly I just walk to class and back so that's not nearly close to summer walking) so I'm so tired and out of shape when I get to camp. I need to really start picking up my walking for this month and a half before camp.

Yeah, for me OE is less work and better pay. It's like a little more chill DC schedule with evening activities because the kids have parent counselors and a rest hour so I have staff housing and an hour off in the middle of the day. It's almost like the best combo of DC and res camp except you don't bond nearly as much. They are only there for one full day and 2 half days and they don't spend nearly as much time with you as res campers (at my camp at least) in those 3 days. I look at a pic of my favorite group last fall and honestly can't remember half of their names but most of my summer groups I can say at least half of every group this summer and still quite a few of the names from previous summers.

Thing is, I'm a pretty athletically built guy and although I'm not in amazing shape, I'm in better shape than most people. I'm a basketball coach and every day in practice I was in there mixing it up with my girls and some days I would have to practice for like 5 hours straight...so its not like I've just done completely nothing since camp. Camp just exhausts me for some reason... It only really worries me though because this year a lot more is expected of me. We have a ton of new staff and its my job to be more of a leader, set a great example for everyone else, lead my cabin, and all type of different things like that. I'm just really hoping I don't get burnt out...


And for OE, ours is a little different from yours I guess. We are in control pretty much from start to finish, only thing we don't do is sleep in the cabins with the kids at night....the parents/chaperones do. But besides that, although there are parents and teachers there, we do all the work. There's no rest hour or anything like that, so we're working all day. We just use the chaperones for extra assistance if we need some during the day. And you definitely don't get a chance to get as close to the kids as you do during the summer but still, we get a chance to interact with the kids quite a bit. Most of our school groups come for 3 days, 2 nights...but some only 2 days, 1 night.

I love OE because everything to those kids are new, its not the same skits and songs or games every year like it somewhat is during the summer. I know I have a much better time doing campfire skits with OE groups.

Oh Ok, we had something like that at Ockanickon in middle school we just called it sixth grade camp though and our counselors were our teachers (for the activities as well)
So that means I should definitely start doing those Jillian Michaels tapes then eh?
I found my first week of student teaching that I was waking up ten minutes later than I was supposed to, just barely getting to school on time, leaving at 3:30, sleeping til six, eating dinner, and then going to bed, and I was still exhausted.
Sometimes kids just take it out of you, even the good ones. My class was like a model class but just, keeping up with their thought processes and keeping an eye on everyone at all times, it just gets tiring. I am confident it will pass

oh man Jillian Michaels. Love the biggest loser and can't wait for her new show too! Nah, it's mostly just getting used to walking everywhere and a lot. Just get in a lot of walking before you go.

Yeah, kids take it out of you on the best of days! I started working at a day care from 8-6 Friday nights and thought I would be fine considering I work at camp from 7am-9pm with the kids (minues my 2 hour TO) and then I'm "on call." I've never been that tired after a day at camp. On my first Friday I went to bed at 7. I'm used to going to bed at 2am.

Whoot! 2 more days of work, and 25 days until I leave!!!

39 days... why do I feel like my camp starts really late?
P.S. none of the other group leaders took advantage of said email list... i was trying to leave time/room in case one of the people who has been doing this for like 4 years wanted to be the first person to email everyone... and now I'll just feel like an annoyance if i email people....

I hate it when that happens Heathesaurusex! (side note- is there a preference for a shortened version of your username we can use or something?!) I guess I'd just email, but at the same time I would also be really reluctant to. hmm

I've got 49 til my summer starts. Most of the people on here have camps that start a lot earlier, but they end earlier too! Also, keep in mind that half of them go to the same camp (yay Cedarledge!) Oh, and if I were just general staff (and not working the extra week before staff training) I wouldn't be starting until July 2nd for precamp.

The one session of OE I get to do is in 36 days!!!!!!!!! And summer in 49!!! Yay less than 50 days!!!! It's going to fly by as well. I swear just yesterday I was baffled that it was May and now it's basically May 8th! My goodness!

I'm going for pre-camp work but also, due to different school schedules throughout the states, most new england camps start early and end early.. being from missouri and then going to maine I actually miss a day or two of school each year..

There's ten total weeks of camp that our summer program staff work although we only have 8 weeks of summer camp. So we start the second week of June, end the last week of August...or maybe its the second to last week of August. Either way, we work a lot.

I actually find that a lot New England camps actually start later in the season compared to camps elsewhere. We have a June 20th start date for pre-camp and go through August 15th. That's because of the school schedule. My students' last day is June 21st - and I have teacher day on the 22nd. So I miss two days of pre-camp. We don't go back to school until after Labor Day though, giving me a few weeks after camp to recuperate! But it definitely all depends on where you are and what camp you are at. My staff have 44 more days till res camp pre-camp begins.

Oh! Ha, you can just call me Heather. Sorry, I'm sure i should have said that in my intro post.
I feel a bit better now though.
I figure I'll give them till like mid week next week cuz maybe they're just busy but I mean... 2 of the people who got the list were the ULs (which is one step above GLs) so I kind of would have thought they'd be all over it...

nah, don't worry about it! I wouldn't have thought about it either, and usually we just come up with our own shortening but some of them don't have as much of an obvious spot to shorten (such as Rosethorn=Rose, while your username is a bit more "nonsense words" or words combined, though it is kinda cool to say!)

Yeah, I tend to think so too, but then I find that my enthusiasm is a step or two above most peoples. Sure they love camp and are excited, but the type of people who frequent this message board (especially as often as we do) are a little more exuberant in our love of camp!

Such as on our camp Facebook page. It took a long time to get it frequented even in a little way by anyone except for me. I got in there as the 1st person to join after the directors and then proceeded to answer every little thing on there. I was probably the person who did the most on the page, including posting some pics and descriptions of camp itself.

oh and 35 and 48 days!!!!!!!!!

Yeah but I also dont want to get to camp and have everyone go 'Oh God... here comes Heather...' lol

Oh yeah, it's supposed to be like tyrranosaurusrex... like a T-Rex except its me lol.