By: Lisette Perez, Montclair State University
Many of us know the traditional camp experience includes activities such as fishing, camping or kayaking but many students (and their parents!) also have an interest in expanding their skills for a classroom setting and having an interactive camp experience at the same time! Write on Sports is a perfect outlet to combine academic support through project-based learning by turning middle school students into reporters, exploring topics of their choice while strengthening literacy skills, building confidence all through the lens of journalism.
So why should your child come to the Write on Sports Summer Camp? Here are some of the benefits of students participating in an educational summer camp! According to the American Camp Association, these benefits include:
#1. Summer writing camps develop social skills
Summer camps can help develop skills that are important for a student’s educational as well as professional development, they can be applied in and out of the classroom. These skills include:
- Leadership
- Communication
- Participation
These skills are beneficial to their future careers and meeting personal goals which an environment such as a summer writing camp can assist with. Leadership, communication and participation works to teach students teamwork and the importance of their voice and how writing on a topic as loved as sports will bring them more skills that they will need to succeed
#2. Self- Respect and Character Building
One of the best ways for students to build character and self-respect can be through a summer writing camp such as Write on Sports. Skills that can be gained through this summer camp are:
- Responsibility
- Resourcefulness
- Resilience
Responsibility, resourcefulness and resilience are skills that are needed not only in everyday life but especially in writing and education. Learning these skills in a summer writing camp are essential to expanding such important skills such as being an effective writer and when it comes to writing about current events, research papers and especially sports and the arts. Where someone gets their information from is just as important as making sure that the information is useful for its intended purpose.
#3.Community Living/ Service Skills
Last but not least, this summer writing camp can help students work on their social skills in community living and service, which lead to other attributes such as:
- Caring
- Fairness
- Citizenship
- Trustworthiness
These attributes in combination with growing and expanding on writing skills prove to be valuable. Write on Sports’ summer writing camp works to incorporate writing and play. Students will be able to learn to be caring, fair and trustworthy within their writing which will not only gain them credibility and experience to produce curated pieces of writing but work to improve their communications skills in and out of the classroom which is important in today’s world.
Write on Sports (WoS) is a non-profit literacy organization that helps middle school students develop writing and reading skills. The program uses project-based learning, empowering students to self-select a topic of interest and authentic learning experiences which include a field trip, to strengthen writing skills. Write on Sports offers after school writing programs and workshops in addition to summer writing camps. During the summer of 2024, Write on Sports will be hosting summer camps in multiple New Jersey counties in addition to camps in California, Colorado, Indiana, and Rhode Island. To register for the Write on Sports summer program, click here.
