This week, our tween becomes a teen!
Just a few months ago, he was a PSLE kid (like the rest of the Primary 6 kids in Singapore).
But with the drop of a ‘double u’ (like a blink of an eye), he graduates to teen-hood and enters his Secondary School years.
These few weeks of going from tween to teen have been marked by two camps:
In December, we sent him for his first-ever Youth camp organised by our church, where he stayed out for 4 days and 3 nights. He was amongst the youngest, with youths there from 12 to 18 years old.
He learnt to pack his own bag, experienced hostel living and played as a team. He had a relatively comfortable hostel bed and relatively good food.
He gave his best to team games to score extra team points, including waking up at 6am (when everyone else was still asleep) and having the courage to go on stage to sing a worship song.
His team won the Camp games.
A few weeks later, in January this year, he went for a compulsory 4 days 3 nights school camp, where he and his cohort stayed in the boondocks in much less comfortable conditions.
They slept in sleeping bags on hard floors, had the most basic of necessities and food. And used toilets, which brought on salutes for anyone who dared go there.
He did not relish the living conditions. But he enjoyed the outdoor activities and gave his best at the team games.
And he didn’t lose a single item from his camp (which I learnt is quite a feat, given the massive Lost and Found pile which teachers and peer leaders collected.)
He was named Best Camper 2024 (with 4 other boys) in the total cohort of about 300 boys.
It’s an encouraging start to teenhood:
- Learning independence.
- Building resilience and teamwork.
- Persevering through challenges.
There will be much more in the teen journey:
- Stumbles and falls
- Failure (and failings)
- Emotional scrapes
My prayer is that through it all, Caleb will walk closely with God and grow in resilience, wisdom and discernment.
And for us parents, we will need to grow alongside him.
To know when to speak and when to be silent.
When to reach out, when to pull back.
And to undergird it all with love. Because love never fails.
“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
– 1 Corinthians 13:13
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