Activities

The staff took the initiative to organise this camp in for the older boys. This was to give the boys an opportunity to be with their friends for a night away from the parents. This was a first for all of them. Their parents were very anxious but were willing to give it a try. One of the boy’s mother was especially grateful that her son was given the chance for this experience.

The boys had an enjoyable time with all the activities lined up for them. The theme of the camp-in was ‘RESPECT’. Lessons were taught in teaching them to respect others; parents, elders, teachers, friends, etc. Apart from that they had to cook pasta for their dinner, made pancakes for their breakfast, made cookies. They played games in the backyard and did art and craft. They had so much fun and one of the boys even asked to stay another night!

2 of the autistic boys, who finds it hard to accept certain textures of food were really challenged during meal times but they managed to eat up their food after their teacher turned it into a challenge between all the boys.

All in all, we had a good insight on how the boys managed themselves and their own belongings. These insights helped us how to advice the parents on their child’s needs, weaknesses and strengths.

Kudos to the staff for working so hard in organising this camp. It was very tiring, especially after a sleepless night, checking in on the students, (one of them was crying for his parents from 3 am onwards till 5 am. He only quietened down after being threatened to send him downstairs to sleep alone. Despite it all, the staff felt that it was well worth the effort.

27 students participated in this visit, some with their parents. It was a very exciting and meaningful visit. The firemen were very patient with the students, explained procedures and allowed the students to handle the fire fighting equipment. They did demonstrations of putting off a fire, and even got the students to participate. Even the most fearful students and the introverted autistic students came out of their ‘world’ and joined in the activities.

The finale was taking the students for a ride in the fire engines and allowing them to sound the siren in the fire engine. One of the students, who was initially crying because he could not tolerate the sound of the siren surprisingly accepted it after the ride in the fire engine.

We had to bring 2 of our own fire extinguishers for the firemen to show us how to use them and buy 5 lits each of petrol and diesel to start a big fire. It was worth the show.

This visit involved 7 of the older students, ages between 11-16 yrs. The students were required to write letters to their parents and a classmate. At the post office, they bought their own stamps and posted their letters.

The students were then given the opportunity to buy their own food and drinks for refreshments, count the cost and ask for the change on their own, before returning to the centre.

They were taught to look out for each other before the visit. During the visit, they showed so much responsibility towards each other, it was marvellous to see that they can be trusted to carry out instructions.

A few of these students are quite close with each other. However, there were 2 students who were not a part of the group. This visit helped them to bond with these two and they are now included and accepted in their class activities.