Joys, Aggravations, Lessons and Chinese Buffet

When our “Kid’s Weeks” camps were approaching this year I quickly reminisced on last years adventures and thought about how big of a smile it put on my face at the end of the week. First, for the great times I had just experienced, and second, handing the children back over to their parents with a new perspective on life. Many of the newbie instructors received advice from me on what to expect, “It is a constant test in patience and humility, as well as a contest for the kids to find out how many different ways they can ask the same question.”

The premise of our “Youth Kayak Adventures” is to build confidence in a special week of “camp” packed with fun, adventure and kayaking all in a supportive environment. This could not be closer to the truth. Our core instruction programs from novice to advanced focus on skill progressions to become better paddlers, whereas “Kids Weeks” focus primarily on group awareness, support and fun. In my typical clinic format I have a tendency to focus on skills and drilling, where everything is focused and goal oriented. This is a common quality of an adult world. Kid’s just wanna have fun, and if they learn something… cool! I do find however if you brief children on daily expectations, what to anticipate, group awareness and group safety, they will have more fun and they will learn their lessons from the river as they go along. This aspect of “Kids Weeks” has taught me the virtue of play in my daily instruction.

The coolest thing about working with children is their raw emotion and their ability to express their feelings, as opposed to adults who for the most part are largely guarded with their emotions on the water. This requires us as instructors to do a lot more talking to either feel out, encourage or reinforce particular skills or emotions on the water for adults. Simply stated, with children you just do not have that. I am not saying that it does not happen, but in large part the majority of children and teens wear what they are feeling on their sleeves. They will let you know when they are not happy, if they are bored, hungry, scared, ecstatic or tired. They do not need the constant reinforcement of what they are doing right or wrong (on the water). To them, if they are smiling, they are doing something right. And if they are not, something is wrong. Our biggest job during these weeks is to facilitate a positive experience and reinforce this positive experience with some hard skills and soft skills that they have unknowingly learned.

Initially I had a hard time coping with all of these ideas, especially when my kids decided that they would rather swim in the rapids as opposed to ferry, peel out or eddy out. Afterall, if this was any other clinic these basic skills would be the primary focus of the first day for a novice. It personally frustrated me that they would be so immature as to jump in the river and play instead of learn. Then it hit me like a brick wall. The children were actually learning to become comfortable with their new environment and were learning the most fundamental self-rescue skill. Maybe if I jumped in the river a little more often I would not be so petrified to swim! An opportunity had suddenly presented itself and a teachable moment arose from the ashes like a phoenix. Before too long I had the kids doing aggressive swimming techniques and understanding how their “play” is useful as a tool. This is also where I realized I cannot control the entropy of the group dynamic, but instead have to find a way to fit into it.

Let me clarify some things before I lead people to thinking that these weeks are some scary, disorganized blob of children screaming, kicking and biting their way downstream. We focus tremendously on group responsibility and awareness. On the first night of a clinic we spend some time establishing group goals as well as individual goals and how the group will have to work together to achieve them. As Jon Clark so succinctly puts it, “you have to have the respect talk.” In my past experience with team-building we would have called this a “Full Value Contract.” Though I never do anything as structured as a “ Full Value Contract,” It is always good to have a verbal agreement with the group to bring those individual and group goals back into focus.

The most important aspect of our “Kids Week” is simply, play. We as adults get so wrapped up in our “real world” that we have forgot the virtue of play and how much it teaches us. When an adult begins to play like a child there is some level of embarassment or immaturity associated with that person. However my personal experiences learning and teaching, the student always learns best when smiling, laughing, or playing. Children typically will listen when they are ready for a lesson, and we as adults can take a lesson from our children.

“Family Fun Day” is where the kids are reunited with their families after five days and the fun and chaos takes a float down the Nantahala River. This has to be one of the most spectacular sites on the “Nanty” as a group of fifty kids, parents and instructors start moving downstream. This becomes a great time for the kids to showcase their newly acquired kayaking skills to their parents. However, what stands out above all to me is that despite their families being there, they pay more attention to their new friends in their respective groups and make sure that everyone is together and safe. This makes me beam like a proud parent because I feel this is the effect we have as instructors here at NOC. This demonstrates that our instruction with the kids not only showcases kayaking skills, but life skills such as self-reliance, group responsibility and awareness. Not too mention social skills that they utilize to make new friends throughout the week. In conlusion and after all of this being said, “Kids Week” is on the top of my list for best times on and off the river. Head Instructor Rob Barham sums it up pretty well, “Woohoo! Kid’s Week… Chinese Buffet! Woohoo!”

All photos courtesy of Jon Clark

Kids rule Family Fun Day

The first kids week ended this past Friday with Family Fun Day, a special day when parents join their kids on a paddling trip down the mighty Nantahala River. It was fun to watch the kids show off all their new kayaking skills to their parents as they went down the river. I asked some parents what they liked most about sending their kids to a week long kayaking camp and the resounding answer was that they see an amazing amount of character growth during this week of kayaking. The kids are easily sold on how much fun kayaking is but hidden in the kayaking secessions are many lessons about life that they do not get at other camps. Kids learn an amazing amount judgment, self awareness, self reliance, responsibly for oneself and others, and that feeling of personal achievement when they complete a rapid upright is priceless. Well for the parents anyway, kids love swimming just as much, so coming out of the boat is just as fun for them.

Jon.Clark's Family Fun Day photoset

Kid Kayakers

It's that time of year again here at NOC; the time when we batten down the hatches, move the instruction crew to DEFCON 2, and remove the sugar packets from the dining room tables. Yes, it's time for our bi-yearly Kid's/Teen Week. For many instructors, the two summer weeks in which we close instruction to adults and just focus on teaching kids is our favorite time of the year. Many of the kids come back year after year and we've had the privilege of watching them progress from tentative beginners to class 5 creekers. If you've got kids and are looking to get them into boating then here's a few suggestions we've picked up over the years:

1. Kids rarely place the same pressure on themselves that adults do. I've seen many novice adults disappointed in themselves after flipping at Nantahala Falls their first time running it. I have never met a kid who was disappointed about flipping at Nantahala Falls. They get the same satisfaction (if not more) from doing a successful wet-exit when they flip as they do from running the Falls upright. I cannot count the amount of times I've seen a kid do a wet-exit on the river and come up smiling. Which brings us to the next point...

2. Kids love swimming. And we encourage it. Our first few days are spent doing wet exits and swimming rapids. Sometimes we'll spend a couple hours swimming rapids just to get them comfortable in that environment. (This is particularly important for the younger kids) I've even had kids that wanted to swim Nantahala Falls before they kayaked it. Adults view swimming a rapid as a consequence for their mistake - kids view it as just a fun part of kayaking. Their comfort out of the boat, and in the water, increases their learning curve exponentially.

3. Kayaking is one of the best sports I've seen for teaching responsibility. It never ceases to amaze me the amount of responsibility and good decision making I see from 9-15 year old kids in regards to kayaking. Sure, we put them in safe environments in which they can succeed, but we also allow them to make many of their own decisions on the river - which rapids they run, which lines they'll take, which rapids they'll lead, etc. The results are often amazing. For example, when we ask the kids to choose their own line at Nantahala Falls very few of them actually choose the standard left to right line, eddying-out in Truckstop Eddy, like 95% of boaters do. They often choose completely different lines going down the right side of the Falls which they correctly deduce will give them a greater chance of success than the standard line.

For more information on our Kids/Teen week programs click here

Photos courtesy of Jon Clark: Advanced Kids Week