Staff Training

Photos by Aaron Felske

Engaging. Educating. Memorable.

Beyond Recreation believes that the key to a good summer is a well-trained staff. Staff must know how to work with each other and how to work with children. This is why a staff training session with Beyond Recreation focuses equally on both interpersonal relationships and relating to children.

We start with a general set of modules that are then customized to the needs of each specific camp. A typical day of training runs from after breakfast until 4:00 pm, with an hour break for lunch. We also offer two- and three-day trainings.

Typical One Day Training Schedule

8:3o — Breakfast
9:15 — Warm Up and Introductions
9:45 — Cabin Meetings and Staff Connections
10:45 — Building Relationships with Campers
11:45 — Ages and Stages
12:15 — Lunch
1:15 — Cabin Community: Building a Bully-Free Environment
2:15 — Break
2:30 — Responding to Challenging Behavior
3:45 — Break
4:00 — Backpacks and Bedtimes (Being Camper-Ready on Day One)
5:00 — Depart

AMERICAN CAMP ASSOCIATION STANDARDS

Beyond Recreation covers many of the requirements for training set forth by the American Camp Association (Click here for a list of the standards covered in 2019’s training). We provide an in-depth document outlining our training for inclusion in your ACA binder.

REVISITS AND SUMMER-LONG CONSULTATION

Beyond Recreation can provide a mid-season revisit for camps who have used our training services. During this revisit, we sit with your staff in small group meetings and address their questions, celebrate their successes, give a pep talks, and try to assist in any way we can. This revisit counts as continuing education for the American Camp Association, and also gives your staff members a safe and supportive place to debrief from difficult experiences, express concerns, and share their stories.  Revisits also allow for your staff to build a relationship with the trainer, which has proven to pay dividends in future summers. By building these relationships, the trainers from Beyond Recreation become a part of your camp family, and staff are excited and ready to engage when they arrive on camp.Any camp that engages Beyond Recreation for training also has access to Anne Henningfeld, MA, CTRS all summer long for questions and support. She provides her personal cell phone number to camp directors and is available throughout the camp season to take calls and help camps work through difficult situations.

What Makes Our Training Unique?

THE AUDIENCE CHOICE TRAINING (ACT) METHOD

Every camp director has used role playing in staff training at some time in their career, trying to give staff practice with the tough situations they’ll face over the summer.  These role plays can be spot on, providing the staff members with memorable experiences they’ll recall right in the heat of the moment with a child.  Or they can dissolve into a giggling mess.  Or they can go so far over the top they create a hopeless situation. Or they can make an introverted staff member feel terrible.   These role plays gone wrong can not only waste precious training time, they can end up denying the experience and the knowledge they were meant to impart.  This is why Anne Henningfeld, MA, CTRS, a ten year camp director, partnered with Michael Jay Garner, an entertainer and improv instructor with a degree in Psychology to create the essential role play experience for camp staff.

They started by asking the question, what makes a good role play?  Their answer lead them to a choose-your-own adventure style of group role play based on:

• Believable characters, situations and reactions

• Strong counseling work and responses

• High quality facilitation

The ACT Method takes all the best parts of a role play: the interaction, the spontaneity, the quick thinking, and eliminates the rest, creating an intentional, entertaining and effective experience for camp staff.