A few weeks ago half of the year 9 cohort left Perth on an Eight hour trip to Kalbarri. This camp was very different to any other camp I’ve been on because the whole year was split into two rotations, me being in rotation one, no one in our year had experienced year nine camp before so we went into it with an open mind. It was also very different because we were put with a group of people we barley knew and we all knew we had to work together and use leadership and teamwork in order for our camp to run smoothly
We all quickly got along and started to use initiative in little things. One part of camp where we used leadership and teamwork the most was when cooking. In order to get our food as quick as possible and make sure everyone was happy with their food, we split up jobs. One group would chop the food, another group would cook the food, another would clean up and others would help out. On this camp something we had to do was pack our food. As a result of being unorganised at the start of camp and not packing all our food, some of our meals didn’t have all the ingredients we needed. instead of complaining we compromised and planed out as a group what we would do so that everyone would get enough food and by the end of the night everyone was happy.
At the beginning of camp we split the group up into 4 groups which consisted of leadership, environment, hygiene and cooking. Each group was responsible for each aspect. Leadership group would plan the day, environment group would make sure we left the environment we went into clean, hygiene would make sure everyone was clean before thing like cooking and cooking group would help out during cooking by setting up cleaning and making holes to but our washing up water in. Everyday we switched what group we were in so we could learn from each other. This camp was very student lead. We had certain goals we wanted to achieve in the day but if we had free time which we had a lot of we could do whatever such as go for a swim, play a game or write in our journals which i liked alot.
Another aspect where we used leadership and teamwork was when we were hiking. Before we started our hike we made sure to discuss when to have breaks. In order to make sure the group was all together we had people stand at the front of the group and yell something and if the people at the back responded then we would continue to walk. We switched who was at the front of the group. Along our hikes we had a few people who were injured or felt unwell so we used teamwork in order to get to our campsite but still make the walk entertaining. The weather was also hot whilst we were hiking so we made sure to have lots of water breaks to help prevent people feeling unwell.
As soon as we would get to a campsite we would discuss what exactly we would do so that we wouldn’t waste time. We would all set up our tents, take out food, set up for dinner and maybe sometimes go on a swim. Swimming was definitely a lot of peoples favourite activity to do on camp but before we went swimming we had to do certain things such as set up tents, wait for everyone and make sure we knew exactly who was swimming.
Overall year nine camp was my favourite camp I’ve been on because of how much freedom we got. We all learnt a lot about being in a team and being leaders. if we weren’t working as a team and being leaders our camp wouldn’t have been the same amazing experience We all became friends quickly and that is what led to us having a good time.
