CSSM MB Summer Missionary Manual - Cabin Leader 3
BEING A CABIN LEADER (TEACHER)
CHARACTERISTICS OF A GOOD CABIN LEADER
LOVE OF CHILDREN
A cabin leader is, as the name implies, one who counsels; you are parent, teacher, friend, companion, and guide to your children, the campers, and must have vision enough to see their possibilities and wisdom enough to anticipate and accept their limitations. You must be patient with and appreciative of the ungifted and maladjusted children as well as the talented, amiable ones, and you must have no illusions, realizing that both will turn up in the assortment of personalities with which you deal.
A LEADER AND A MODEL
You must be a leader who sets standards and goals and who, by your own example of honest, clean, godly, straightforward living, inspire your group to imitate you. The ability to attract youngsters will be one of your most priceless assets. Keep in mind that if you are dishonest and don't set a good example you will have a very bad influence as your camper will follow your example. Camper pick up your bad habits and become boisterous, slangy, vulgar, complaining or boastful as you set the pattern. Pretence and shame are soon spotted in the intimacy of camp life. You might as well face it; everything you are, say, and do will be carefully observed by your bright-eyed youngsters who will be quick to detect and equally quick to dislike hypocrisy. They will soon see through an attempt to cover up sloppiness by an "Oh, I just never could keep my room straight or my desk in order." Such a weak-kneed excuse as "I can't ever find time" is similarly revealing. Youth is the period of hero worship and a child's heart is full of faith and love. There is nothing in the world more painful or demoralizing to him than to discover that his beloved idol has feet of common clay and that his seeming virtues are but a thin veneer. Every prospective cabin leader must ask himself if he is willing to live like an inspiring, rather than a disillusioning model.
YOUTHFUL IN SPIRIT, YET MATURE IN JUDGMENT
Camp directors demand cabin leaders with mature judgment. This is not always a matter of chronological age, for some attain it early, while others live to be ninety-seven without ever having demonstrated a particle of it. Campers are too precious to entrust to those whose actions are determined by impulsiveness, without thought of consequences and whim. Yet, with good judgment, you must retain that youthfulness of spirit which keeps you always curious and craving the new, so that, regardless of passing birthdays, you can still enjoy wading in a babbling brook, hunting the hiding place of a frog, or digging for pirates' gold with your campers.
FORTITUDE
You must be able to find happiness in doing a job well and in serving with out thought of personal gain or looking for praise or reward. You must like hard work and plenty of it, for except for brief periods of "time off you will be on duty twenty-four hours a day. You must have enough persistence and will power to replace your wishbone with a backbone and must realize that genius is but 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.