English Language Holidays at Summer Camps

Nowadays, being able to express oneself in English is a necessity when one wishes to be competitive in the job market. When your children become adults, this necessity will have become a must.

When a student registers for our English summer camp, the student is winning on two fronts:

First, he is gaining incredible knowledge and rich life experience within a small group of children his age and secondly developing his oral ability in English. For young people looking to step-up the action in Summer 2007, ESILC's English Language Summer Camp is the place to be! Students will enjoy extreme excitement on more cool and challenging multi-activities than ever before, with new friends from around the world!

Summary of Features & Benefits: Full Descriptions of Summer Camp: The objectives
The ESILC summer camp is instituted in synchronization with our teaching strategy which has makes us the undisputed authority in matters of language training across Asia.

Our summer camp mission is to encourage and develop in children a curiosity and comfort with the English language. Through a positive social environment, group interaction and communication are promoted while respecting individual personalities and desires. Because all ESILC counselors undergo a rigorous training and are provided with the latest resources in TEFL games and activities, ESILC guarantees each child a broad range of age-appropriate activities in a safe, fun and challenging English environment.

Good support and supervision
ESILC provides its young learners with professional and competent monitors, rigorously trained and knowledgeable in the ESILC method and philosophy. Under the constant supervision of a monitor and the camp coordinator, the children are teamed up in very small groups according to their age, their knowledge of English and their personality.

Choice of dates: Four weeks in March; Four weeks in April

Learning English With English Is What Sets Us Apart
ESILC Summer Camp offers a very unique proposition. Every year, children from all over the world have come to ESILC centers to meet and share experiences with English. ESILC Summer Camp is a recipe that has won much praise and the summer camps' international flavor really sets us apart.

Integrated Language learning
ESILC Summer Camp has a superb reputation for leading the way in Integrated Language and Activity Camp holidays. No one else manages to combine, so successfully, quality English teaching with an action-packed program of sports and activities - all set in holiday camps.

Learning Beyond Lessons
During classroom sessions, students will interact with books, tapes, videos and games that are purpose-designed for different ability levels. English in Action also concentrates on using language in everyday situations (eg shopping & excursions etc).

Learn with teachers
Our teachers are hand-picked for their teaching ability and friendly outgoing personalities. They always take the time to explain things carefully and to bring the language to life. Out of language lessons, they find ways to turn every meal, activity and excursion into a great learning opportunity full of fun.

See the Country/City
Our English language holidays offer a number of exciting excursions/trips. These fully supervised trips give young people a chance to visit local attractions under the guidance of specially selected and trained holiday Group Leaders.

Integrated Workbooks
Each student receives a copy of our comprehensive course workbooks. Divided into different attainment levels, the language tutors use the books in conjunction with class work to gently steer students through the many different learning concepts, including grammar, sentence construction and vocabulary.

Our summer camps last for 4 weeks and are filled with adventure activities combined with intensive English study.

On a typical day, students will study from 9:00 to 12:00 in a small group. Then from 1:00 to 4:00 we do an adventure activity.

We do several trips throughout the camp, including trips to Los Angeles, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Long Beach and camping.

Our camp is small. We prefer quality over quantity.

INTRODUCTION
The English language summer camps held in the summers are aimed at children from the ages 12 to 15. The camps will last four week (with breaks over the weekends) and are held in the in-city format. Each camp can host 60 to 90 children. The camps are hosted at our associate school situated in San Francisco, California.

The children will stay in the camps from 9:00 in the morning until noon after which they continue to spend time doing activities with their teachers and counselors, indulging in the EL learning activities in the resource center at the camp or on sporting grounds.

OBJECTIVES OF ESILC SUMMER CAMPS
Our overall objective is the organization of leisure activities for children during summer vacations. The concept of the camp incorporates tasks as familiarizing the children with general human values, developing leadership skills, and bringing the understanding that a foreign language is not simply a means of communication, but rather a way of acquiring new opportunities in one's future professional life.

Learning about the English language and American customs and culture through games, the Internet, songs, video films, and competitions not only in school classrooms, but also in a gymnasium, on the play ground, and in the country side will be remembered for ever. Such an English language camp will become a reference point on one's scale of vital values. It will widen the horizons of students and they will learn to dream and to realize their dreams. Thus, the major objectives of the camps were educational, international, and intercultural, specifically:
  1. To offer opportunities for learning and developing further English language speaking skills for junior and high school level children motivated through English language and cross-cultural studies;
  2. To raise their awareness of American culture through cross-cultural comparisons; to bring youth into close contact within the camp two cultures: the American and Thai cultures.
  3. To develop leadership skills in youth on the basis of specially-designed teaching content and extracurricular activities, the use of motivational methodology techniques, and highly stimulating out-of-class activities;
  4. To accumulate both local and international expertise in EFL teaching and EL interactive activities since the teaching and counseling staff of the camps incorporated both local and international colleagues
  5. To make the best use of our experience in the sphere of ELT and couple it with traditional models of teamwork, creativity, and cross-curricular projects.
Two mainstreams constitute the operational aspect of our summer camps programs: in-class and out-of class-activities.

All in-class and out-of-class activities were meant to contribute to the development of creative thinking, communicative skills, and intercultural awareness.

CAMP TEACHING SCHEDULE
The schedule of teaching activities is very different from a "normal" or traditional school schedule and relies largely on non-traditional, communicative teaching and communicative styles, up-to-date audiovisual aids, the Internet, and, fun-and-games educational activities. The team of instructors including local teachers and native speaker will give students access to absolutely different teaching and communicative styles, different from what the children had been used to in their own classrooms and in a formal school setting.

All communications in the camp including teaching and counseling activities as well as out-of-class activities are organized through the medium of English. Thus the campers are immersed into the English language speaking milieu for at least 6 hours a day during 26 days, characterized by a student-centered approach, positive reinforcement, and presentation of the teaching content through communicative, marketing, and intellectual games, songs, video resources, contest and the Internet.

The technologies and audiovisual teaching aids will be unusually diverse and include the most up-to-date items such as computer class with access to the Internet and e-mail, a karaoke machine, overhead projectors, VCRs, CD and audiocassette players, a video-camera, a digital photo-camera, whiteboards, a screen, and PowerPoint programs.

TEACHING CONTENT AND DESCRIPTION OF THE TEACHING COURSES IN THE SUMMER CAMP
The main objective of the English language learning/teaching in a camp setting is to make the best of accumulated experience in the sphere of ELT and couple it with traditional models of teamwork, creativity, and cross-curricular projects.

In the process of putting together EL educational activities for children in a camp setting, it is important to approach it from various aspects of ELT. Since, in our model, the core of teaching content is based cross-cultural comparisons, each aspect of teaching can be designed with an objective to cover some important issue concerning the country, the people, the language, and other cultural aspects and, thus, to enable children to make meaningful conversations based on new learning and the new language and culture items.

Every teacher's task is to make his/her aspect highly motivating, informative, and enjoyable and, consequently, to create a positive attitude not only to the language and learning experience itself, but to the world of the language the students study as well.

All in-class activities will be aimed at contributing to the development of creative thinking, a tolerant approach to cultures different from one's own, the development and upgrading of communicative skills, and raising intercultural awareness.

EXTRACURRICULAR PROGRAMS IN A CAMP SETTING, SPORTS AND GAMES
All out-of-class activities are meant to contribute to the development of team spirit, leadership potential and skills, relaxing, enjoying the life in the camp, and setting up a network since the campers represented various schools in the city and therefore were to become new friends.

Out-of-class, extracurricular programs are very interesting and campers will speak English with the staff including native speakers, take photos with teachers and counselors All these activities will them more interested in the English language and American culture.

ROLE AND DUTIES OF CAMP COUNSELORS
  1. Make kids' time at the camp as enjoyable as possible, utilizing as much English as possible with the campers;
  2. Act according to the rules accepted in the camp;
  3. Help an instructor to the best of his/her abilities;
  4. Organize fun games, activities during the "counselor's hour";
  5. Reveal the talents of all the campers and involve them in the camp 'Talent Show';
  6. Organize campers, the staff, and the administration for the final 'Amateur Drama Show' in which the performers sing, dance, dramatize, play, and make skits mocking their instructors/counselors in spectacular costumes and outfits, based on the talents they have developed in the camp;
  7. To arrive at the camp in good time before the children start arriving and say goodbye to all the children at the end of the day.
The Senior Counselor of the camp is responsible for planning various types of out-of-class activities, discussing them with the director of the camp, the team of counselors, and setting up a counselor's schedule of all the activities for the duration of the camp. A schedule with games and activities can be seen in the Appendix.

TEACHERS' DUTIES AND SUPPORT
The main objective of EL teachers in the camp is to make best use of their experience in the sphere of ELT, couple this with traditional models of teamwork, creativity and cross-curricular projects. It is important, as well, to be supported by native speaker teachers and counselors to arrive at the end goal: a state-of-the-art, communicative curriculum for teaching English and culture in a camp setting.

Language instructors will teach more than just the rules of language and lists of vocabulary. They will teach their students how to communicate in a new language and to experience deeply what civic education means. They will develop students' self-awareness to many issues through the language and to create an environment for using the language that is as realistic as possible.

Language instructors realize that the content of their lessons must be meaningful and the activities engaging if the students are to be motivated and effective learning and acquisition are to take place. Also, instructors will provide activities that engage the students to use the target language to communicate rather than just imitate.

The duties and roles of teachers/instructors include the following:
  1. To design the syllabus for the teaching course they choose to teach much in advance and to present it for approval to the camp coordinator and administration;
  2. To be always very attentive and positive to campers as the level of the language is different; that's why the teacher should be attentive as some pupils cannot understand even the task; so he/she should help them but not purposely;
  3. Not to talk only by themselves but also make the children talk, ask questions, actively use English by using different games, funny situations, quizzes and stimulating activities;
  4. To make learning sessions and activities as learner-centered as possible; it is always a good idea to remember that children are learning as they are playing and having fun;
  5. To organize contest and competitions in EL activities and writing compositions to develop creative writing skills;
  6. The lessons must be based on fun activities, at the same time interesting, with a lot of activities in order not to make the campers bored;
  7. To be tolerant of campers' attitudes, opinions, behavior and encourage them the best way they can in their learning progress;
  8. To give support to counselors in their extra-curricular activities with campers and to participate in all the events in the camp;
  9. To teach English and EL cultural studies on their own within the learning course they choose to;
  10. To team teaching with a colleague in the learning activity they feel comfortable in;
  11. To offer consultancy in English and EL cultural studies;
  12. To offer methodology advice in training teenagers in a camp setting;
  13. To hold seminars and offering advice in making learning more students centered, in developing critical thinking attitudes in teenagers as well as in other aspects of importance and of interest for campers and the staff;
  14. To offer information on resources and materials including Internet resources such as web-sites and contacts;
  15. To organize extra-curricular activities with campers and the staff demonstrating some games, sports, interactive activities.