Playing and growing

Playing
Winter has been busy here at Wanakita!  Since late December, our Outdoor Centre has welcomed a number of schools, teams, and special interest groups.  We love being able to share our winter wonderland with  children, youth, and adults from across the province.

One memorable event occurred a few weeks ago, when we welcomed a group of grade 11 students from an inner city Toronto school.  This group spent an afternoon tobogganing, and the majority of the students had never experienced sliding down a hill before.  Our staff were amazed to see that the seemingly toughest student in the group was noticeably afraid to go sliding.  He hesitated at the top of the hill, and then screamed the whole way down.  Despite his initial fear, he loved the ride and immediately ran up to the top of the hill to go sliding again!  This young man learned to face his fears, overcome an unfamiliar situation, and experienced success because of it.

We at Wanakita are fortunate to be a part of these incredible outcomes of play every day.

Growing
This past week has been quieter in our full time office, as many of our staff have been away at a variety of training conferences.
The first was the YMCA Camp Kindred.  Every winter, residential and day camping professionals from YMCAs across Ontario gather together.  This is an opportunity to learn about other camps' successes and challenges, and to examine trends in camping and how they impact our various programs.
Following the Kindred, we moved on to the Ontario Camps Association (OCA) annual conference.  The OCA is our province's accreditation body, of which Wanakita is a proud member.  To learn more about the OCA, take a look here

We hope that you are enjoying the winter and taking some time to play and grow yourselves!