Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Camp disaster..need help salvaging the pieces.

So, I thought I found a great camp option for dd12...a leadership camp....she has great leadership qualities so I thought this would be right in her wheelhouse.

First day went so-so according to her. She was not happy with the lack of organization and the teen leaders "fairness". Her words, I wasn't there so I have no idea. The guy who organizes it left me a message last night saying the dd was upset yesterday, but they thought they had it worked out.

We show up this morning and the adult leader just checks in to see if everything is OK, dd again reiterated the lack of organization and fairness issue, to which he says it is all part of the leadership camp, that the point is to work together as a group and some situations are purposefully not organized to see how the groups work together in finding solutions. Throughout the conversation I can tell dd has tuned him out, but the man makes very valid points that we have struggled with for dd....about how you need to go along with the flow sometimes, learning how to compromise, that a strong leader needs to not lead sometimes, that once you get to high school and college you will need to be flexible...all fine and good, we've danced this dance before with her and had made what we thought was pretty darn good progress.

This afternoon I get a call from dd in tears, come pick me up PLEASE...so I talk to the lead guy and after hearing what they both have to say think the best course of action is to retrieve her from the camp. She is in tears, thinks there is something wrong with her, why does this always happen...etc. Truth is it used to happen a lot, but we removed her from a fancy private school 2 years ago and into a smaller gifted school and it really hasn't happened much at all in the last 18 months. I feel like we have taken a huge step backward.

How can I help this kid? I don't want her to bail on situations that aren't going according to her plan. I want to give her the tools to be able to be part of a team (that are not her peers)if the situation calls for it. Let's face it 99.9% of the world is not like her, so unless her circle is very small she is going to need to make it work at times. I would love her to have the fortitude to not let the small stuff get to her.

We are homeschooling this year because her gifted school closed. I worry that we are by isolating her more this way, and it may be an even bigger struggle in the years to come. But I welcome the lack of drama.

She is great peer to peer(individual or group), or with adults, but has always struggled fitting in with same age mates. She is well adjusted, funny, outgoing, and creative, but this hurdle of letting her world fall apart if things don't go according to her idea of fair or just is debilitating. If you didn't know her you would think she is being defiant or is spoiled, but I don't believe that to be the case.

Ugh..how can I help this kid? She is sitting next to me beading right now and happy as a clam, totally over the earlier trauma, but I am heartbroken for her. Any ideas on how to give her the tools to ride out these patches without totally shutting down?

Thanks.....

After reading this post some may say that she does NOT have great leadership qualities? You may wish to work with her on a list of characteristics of leadership, what makes a good leader, etc.

Many families have used helpful resources such as:
- Gifted Kids' Survival Guide,
- What to do when Good Enough isn't Good Enough (perfectionism)
- What's Bad About Being Too Good (perfectionism)
- Great Potential Press
- Prufrock Press
- free spirit publishing
- Royal Fireworks Press
- Magination Press, American Psychological Association
- website Social Thinking (emotional intelligence)
- The Unwritten Rules of Friendship, which includes a chapter on leadership

It sounds like your child is most comfortable with a lot of structure and knowing what is coming next, but lacks the give-and-take skills to collaboratively brainstorm with others on what may be some good ways to structure or organize something?

This is unfortunate as the discussion offered her the opportunity to gain insight into the process and exclaim, "Oh, now I get it! When __X__ happens, I could do __Y__!"

You may wish to attempt revisiting those conversations with her at home:
- What are some things you could have done differently?
- What are some things you might choose to do differently when a similar situation presents itself in the future?

Is she aware of signs that her tension is building? Might she learn to take a moment to compose her thoughts? Would a simple checklist help her?
- Is something dangerous (or does she just not like it)?
- Is something wrong, meaning bad, such as against the law, rules, or ethics (or does she just not like it)?
- Etc... questions tailored to whatever her sticking point(s) may be

Rigid thinking can be a sign of ASD.

What approach did the smaller gifted school take which led to success, and which you might adopt and use to coach her consistently in the same manner at home?

One idea might be to not rescue her from camp under these circumstances.

Some may say the idea of intellectual peers would not apply at leadership camp in the same manner it would in a classroom focused on academic curriculum.

You may wish to help her learn to articulate precisely what seems unfair, to whom it seems unfair, when or where or how or why it seems unfair, and what she deems would be fair, then listen to why things were done a certain way and why what occurred may be fair. This skill (presenting a problem, suggesting a solution, listening to the other side) can be a building block toward calm and productive self-advocacy; There are always multiple viewpoints.

If she's not ready to practice these skills with others in person, possibly books may help, as she will tend to see similar concepts presented by multiple authors in a variety of words and pictures. This may help her realize they can't all be wrong... they may be onto something.

Another idea may be to brainstorm with her on finding the good. You might begin by an exercise in having her find the good in the camp activities, other kids, and camp leadership. You may wish to have her write a letter to the camp director thanking him for those good things which she experienced. She might even be able to come up with something which she learned (even if it was a latent thought which bloomed upon reflection at home after leaving camp).

She's still pretty young to have had much experience with leadership. She may have good qualities as far as deciding a course of action that seems right, but that's not the same as understanding where other people are coming from and how to work together to determine what's best. Is it an option for her to go back to the camp tomorrow?

Have you considered having her read some books about leadership? How to Win Friends and Influence People (Carnegie) is a classic and might be a good start. Learning to see things from the other person's point of view is so valuable. She doesn't need to beat herself over not doing that naturally. For most of us, it is certainly a skill learned with practice and by learning (books, TEDTalks, etc.) the fundamentals.

Good point. I should have prefaced by saying in variety of situations she does, this was an epic fail. :-).


I have some of these and will check out the rest - thanks.



The funny thing is my daughter said almost that same thing to the lead counselor, however, in practice I have seen the opposite side of her more often than not. She actually seems to thrive in a more free flow atmosphere with some structural limits.


Again this has been situational, she thrives in some environments and is a collaborative member, in others she did what she did today.



We have, and again she totally heard and got the gentleman's points. And she always has ideas of how to handle things differently, the problem is the heat of the moment takes over her brain, and we are back at square 1 or maybe 2 at this point and then she gets incredibly down on herself for letting it happen again.


This is the path I am going to explore with her now...


I'm sorry I don't know what ASD is.....


They did what we suggested, which is to give her the space to come to a good decision on her own. In general, if she has 5 minutes to escape from the situation to think about it she will make good choices. She did not have an opportunity today to compose herself privately and this may have exacerbated the situation.


It's a tightrope we walk...at some point you have to take into consideration the other people that are being affected which is why the decision was made to remove her today. But as I said to my husband today...I won't be able to rescue her in college so she is going to have to figure out how to work it out herself.




I would disagree with that, because I have seen it in play over the last several years.



Yep.



Good idea.


Another good idea..thanks indigo.

My sympathies Labmom - I know I have selected activities in the past that I thought were perfect for my darling children - and turned out to be - not so perfect.

It is hard sometimes to know whether to keep pushing a child to continue or give it up as a lost cause. I don't know exactly how to 'pick up the pieces' in this situation, but some ideas...

Is it possible she'd give the camp another try after a break from it at home and some time to process what happened? Or maybe after a one on one discussion with the camp leader? (My DD was persuaded to give a camp a second try after an initial refusal - took some persuasion by my DH and the camp director. Eventually that camp was a success)

Sometimes I have given up on an activity after one of my children has shown an absolute refusal to participate. Honestly, if my child decides to stand there and not talk to anyone or participate at all - and my kids are quite capable of doing that for the length of the activity - it's a waste of everyone's time. I try to take the attitude that they're just not ready _Yet_ for that skill, activity, whatever.

Perhaps there are other ways to learn leadership skills that work better for your child? In a smaller group, or while doing another activity she enjoys?

Re: Inflexible thinking - my kids both demonstrate this trait from time to time. A resource that was recommended to us is The Explosive Child (http://www.amazon.com/The-Explosive-Child-Understanding-Chronically/dp/0062270451).

Don't judge by the title necessarily - my kids do not 'explode' but rather tend to shut down when things get overwhelming. THe book is really a lead-in to Green's 'collaborative problem solving' technique, which has some useful ideas (the main one being that children do well when they can, and when they can't it's because they haven't developed certain skills - yet).

Possibly this scientific explanation may help her: its from the book, Make Your Worrier a Warrior, (2013, Great Potential Press) authored by Daniel Peters Ph.D. who lends expert insight to understanding what a child may be experiencing. For example, pages 44-45 suggest that parents may wish to think of acting out as
Armed with this knowledge, working on helping a child understand nuances of feelings and vocabulary to express their interpretation of what they are experiencing, may prove helpful.

You are on top of this. This camp and any others may need to know about the 5-minute technique, proactively. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Without an adult initiating an inquiry, your child may need to request to be excused for a moment, knowing that her request will be respected.

In this context, ASD refers to Autism Spectrum Disorder. https://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/autism/hcp-dsm.html
High-functioning Autism used to be referred to as Asperger's.
This article may be of interest as it compares/contrasts several observable similarities and differences between gifted children on the Autism spectrum and gifted children not on the Autism spectrum. http://www.grcne.com/giftedAsperger.html

Great word, great outlook.

Yeah my kids learn leadership a bit differently. Volunteering regularly to the point of competency in the volunteering activity so that when new people join he takes on a leadership role and is asked to take on more and more responsibility.

In his sport we talk about what makes a good teammate and what makes a good leader. He has slowly risen through the ranks as a newbie to leadership (quiet leadership as opposed to cheerleader type leadership). You can count on him and he leads by example and the team depends on him. (Actually he is on two teams a club team and a school team). He also volunteers with the little guys on the club team and they just adore him. Later as they grow with the sport the coach will turn to him to offer the little guys extra encouragement and pep talks when they need it.

In school he just does his work quietly and gets excellent scores and is very quiet. When he does speak, people listen. When he does crack a joke it is powerful (because it will be extremely funny and unexpected). He is still learning about give and take In group academic projects, easier to just take over and do it his way.

But he would absolutely hate a contrived leadership camp. A technology camp with 4 projects and leadership opportunities...great. A camp where you work on national history day projects with leadership or partnership skills as a benefit fine. Model UN, some sort of state government camp...all good.

I guess I think you need a real activity that you are passionate about and not just leadership as the camp focus...you won't be a leader at every activity or project.

Just my opinion

Well, this is my "duh" moment! Cookie you are brilliant...and I should have thought this through. In hindsight, I should have seen this coming a mile away, if I would have really thought about the focus of the camp. Not that this excuses dd's complete shut down today, but if I would have been a smart Mom I could have saved her the grief. We obviously still need to work on what to do when life isn't going your way aspect of all of this, and that will be the lesson I take away.

Yes, yes, yes...I have not had to advocate for her in this way for a while and apparently thought we were past the hump. She had been good about telling those that knew her when she needed space, but apparently this was not a situation she felt comfortable advocating for herself, and in retrospect I should have prepped the camp. Lesson learned.