During the summer I lead a camp in Surany. Surany is a small town in the middle south of Slovakia. For this camp, we were 3 leaders and 6 volunteers, they were from: Brazil, Spain, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine and the camp was for two weeks.
Hey, my name is Ivan, I’m from France and I was a volunteer at INEX Slovakia. I will talk about my experience in one camp where I was a leader.
During the summer I lead a camp in Surany. Surany is a small town in the middle south of Slovakia. For this camp, we were 3 leaders and 6 volunteers, they were from: Brazil, Spain, Mexico, Russia and Ukraine and the camp was for two weeks. The objective of the camp was to teach kids English language, from 6 to 14 years old. Our idea was to do it by some interactive activities, in order to make the learning process funnier for them. Before the camp started, we had decided about the topic we would like to teach kids. As the camp was for two weeks and kids came during working days, we had 10 days and 10 different topics. My favorites were when we worked on body parts and about environment. For example, for this topic of environment, we split kids into groups and we started the day with some discussion about the topic and asked some questions in order to know more about what they know on the topic.
Then we created some trash boxes with cartoon and paper for recycling and, we went in the city center for collecting trash. Kids were very interested and they enjoyed collecting trash, they took it as a competition. During these two weeks, we tried to force them to speak in English as much as possible and I was very surprised about the English level of some of them.
This camp in Surany was also a good opportunity to visit new places. We went for hiking one weekend all together to a very beautiful place in the middle of Slovakia. But we also visited one of the most famous town in Slovakia: Banská Štiavnica. Around this town, you can find a lot of activities to do. It could be walking in the street, visiting mines, hiking or just chilling with a coffee.
This camp was my first one and the idea to meet volunteers from all around the world and to share some funny moments was a very good experience. International voluntary camps give you the chance to see the world and to grow up as a person. I suggest everyone to try it. Behind this idea to participate in a camp, you have the opportunity to meet people which are from different countries, cultures… But they are here for the same reason as you. In the end of the camp I can tell, that they became very good friends.
During this camp, I have learnt that the role of the leader is very important. You need to find a balance between responsibility and being a part of the group with volunteers. One thing I also realized, the leader have to be respected by volunteers in order to be credible when he is explaining something. This camp and being the leader was a very good experience that I would love to do again.
Ivan Talvas, I’m 25 years old and I’m from France. I spent 1 year as a volunteer in Slovakia. I studied sociology for 3 years and after some experiences in volunteering, I have decided to come to Slovakia in order to continue in this world of volunteering. I have travelled a lot during my studies and coming to Slovakia was a great opportunity to visit this part of Europe.
