A day in the life of a Children's Courier
About 8.30am after breakfast, I meet with the rest of the Fun Station team to discuss the day’s activities. We have a weekly plan which is displayed on our notice board but each session requires a more detailed plan where we consider how long each activity might take and what equipment we will need. Our tent always has to be brightly decorated and interesting for the age range of children we look after and each day we need to make sure it is clean, safe and tidy before the session begins.
We look after children from school age to 12 but some of us specialise in particular age groups or sports activities. Wherever possible, we try to split our activities for different ages so that the sessions are appropriate, fun and challenging.
Today our first session starts at 10am, so we head up to the Fun Station tent by 9.30 to get the equipment ready and make sure we are ready to sign the children in as they arrive. We have some older children who have been here a while and they are very confident and like to help us out. Some of the younger children are new and therefore a little shy so we make a special effort to make them feel welcome.
Once everyone is signed in we start the session - the younger children are face painting with an animal theme whilst the older ones are playing kwik cricket and our coaching skills are put to the test as we try and teach them to play pop lacrosse. We have our faces painted too and the some of the older children take time out to put the finishing touches to our designs. The younger ones then have an animal parade round the site making animal noises and singing songs - it’s great advertising for Fun Station!
Once the session is over we clean up, grab some lunch and have a quick dip in the pool before getting ready for the afternoon’s ‘Sport’s Day’ session which starts at 3pm. We have a lot more children for this session so we are kept very busy! It’s tiring keeping things organised and fun for two and a half hours, but it’s great to see the children enjoying themselves. After lots of games and races and a lot of loud cheering, it’s soon time for the parents to collect the younger children, so we have a chat to them and tell them about the next days activities - hopefully most of them will be back again tomorrow!
In the early evening we visit new families to introduce ourselves and tell them what Fun Station is all about. We also find out what the children like doing and try and incorporate this into our programme. We also try and keep everyone else up to date with what’s going on as we go round the campsite - sometimes we end up with loads of children following us round, telling us about their day or just joking around with us.
Tuesday is our day off and we usually head to the beach or into the local town. It’s a nice break and it’s great that we all have the same day off together. We have a really good team spirit and spend a lot of time together as a team.
Even in the evenings we often see the children in the restaurant or bar and it’s nice to sit and chat with their families, though sometimes I have to explain to the younger ones that I can’t paint their faces while they’re eating in the campsite restaurant!
