Year 8 Camp - PLAYING ALL IN

Shalini Akhil

Year 8 Coordinator

The Year 8 cohort enjoyed an adventure-filled camp at The Summit , Trafalgar East, this term.

The Summit is spectacular;  an award-winning camp venue in beautiful  environs that offers students a huge variety of opportunities to challenge themselves, to grow and develop as individuals and to contribute as a member of their team and community. 

Given the disruption to their Year 7 studies and lack of camp last year, this camp was also an important opportunity to consolidate friendships, to instill a deeper sense of belonging for the members of the cohort and to strengthen relationships between the students and staff.  

To support these outcomes, the staff team included two Education Support staff (Wellbeing & Administration), and all the staff relished the chance to meet students in a more informal environment, to share the new experiences with them - and to PLAY ALL IN!

My Year 8 Camp Experience

Aleksandra Marijan

Year 8

 I was so nervous before going on camp. I was worried that I would be homesick, but I needn't have worried at all - camp was a really enjoyable experience for me! I had a lot of fun doing the camp activities - especially the Cave Challenge and the Monster Course. 

 Activity Groups

At camp,  we were put into cabins with our friendship groups,  but for activities we were separated into Activity Groups - mostly with students that we did not know, or who we were not very familiar with.  At first my friends and I were disappointed by this, but we soon realised that it was fun, easy and interesting to make new friends as part of a team, and everyone in my Activity Group was very friendly and supportive, always encouraging each other to do their best.  I remember being very nervous to do the Cave Challenge as I am scared of the dark. Ms Cooke and my teammates really encouraged me (they even said that it was okay if I chose not to complete it) and this helped me realise that I could take control in the situation.  I decided to go through the cave with Ms Cooke and I felt really good that I conquered my fear of the challenge - it was great!  Because there are so many students in my year level (there are  over 180 of us, you know!) being part of this group meant that I met and made friends with some people I had never have had the chance to spend time with before, so this was a good opportunity. 

Free Time

During the day, me and my friends all worked in our different Activity Groups, but then at meal breaks and in our free time we got to 'catch up' and talk about the activities we had been doing.  We had plenty to talk about too!  We discussed how challenging the activities were, how we felt we performed at them and how much fun we had doing  them. We all agreed that sometimes it was really hard to convince yourself that you could do something,  but that once you got started it was always fine!

Meal times were noisy and fun – and we were so busy and active doing activities all day that we were starving when it was time to eat! I thought the food was great – it was camp food! Our evening activities (a Trivia Competition on Monday and a Movie Night on Tuesday) were also good fun - we could really relax and unwind after being so busy and focused during the day (thank you, Ms Akhil!).

 And the Monster Course!    All the Activity Groups competed on the Monster Mud Run Course - and you can see from the photos that it was a real challenge!   I was hesitant to do the run because I did not know what to expect,  but we were competing as a team which really helped.  I think I expected the run to be far harder than what it was, but we were all able to get through the course with a bit of effort, encouragement and teamwork.  By the time I had to crawl through the mud pit (under the chicken wire) and had finished making mud angels in the mud, I was not at all worried - I just got on with the course, had fun and did my best - mud and all!  

I was so proud of myself and my team when we finished the course - then the coach told us that they would like us to do it again. I was taken by surprise and thought they were joking at first.  Then, Coach explained that sometimes in life you are asked to go above and beyond - even when you think that you have nothing more to give - and before I knew it the team was off again!  At the end of that second run through the Monster Course I was even more proud of myself; I couldn't believe that I had made it through AGAIN.  Not bad, considering I had started with such doubts!  Not only did I prove that I could do it once,  I proved that I had the ability and motivation to complete it TWICE! Others in my team felt the same - but we didn't hang around to talk about, we just headed straight for the showers to wash off all that mud!

 Play All in

At the beginning of camp, the Summit coaches gave us 5 recommendations.  They told us to: 

1. Have fun
2. Get comfortable being uncomfortable
3. Play ‘All In’
4. Make mistakes 
5. Have no regrets

I am proud to say that I took on those ideas - I had lots and lots of fun, really stepped out of my comfort zone, gave it my best effort, made mistakes (so learned a lot along the way) and I have NO regrets.  Ultimately, I came away from camp with some fantastic memories and having really enjoyed the experience!

Click on the gallery below to enlarge photos - and see just how much fun we had at camp!