Confidence Camp

Youth Services Director Martin Becerra-Miranda has a lot to share right now - three exciting offerings from the Colorado Center for the Blind for blind youth and their families. We like to think of it as a dazzling summer triple!

First Base

FAST Saturday, May 22

Mort the Mouse Goes on an Adventure is an in-person activity at CCB that involves a tactile children’s book by Ann Cunningham and a scavenger hunt with rewards at the end, but strangely no cheese. Read more and RSVP!

Rounding Second

June 21 to 25 Confidence Camp for youth ages 4 to 10

Confidence Camp is back for the summer of 2021! If your blind or visually impaired child between the ages of 4 and 10 would enjoy a one-week day program focusing on independence and lots of fun, then Confidence Camp is the answer!

Bring the whole family and #comerunwithus #6dotdashco. You can Read more about this year’s 6 Dot Dash 5K, or Go Straight to the Registration Page.

The National Federation of the Blind of Colorado and the Colorado Center for the Blind are partnering again for our 2nd 6 Dot Dash 5k, June 29! Our first year was a big success with 191 runners (and/or walkers) and netting more than $5000 for our Braille literacy and scholarship programs. Not bad for the first lap! Besides, it was a lot of fun.

This year is shaping up to be even bigger and better, with more kid activities, local food vendors, live music and more beer, just to name a few of this year’s additions. It’s a great way to spend a mid-summer Saturday morning!

These are the faces of just a few who have benefitted from previous Colorado Gives Day donations. They range from ages 5 and up and their circumstances are all a bit different, but all have gained the skills and the confidence to “Take Charge with Self-reliance!”

This year our Confidence Camp for Kids (CC4K) had 11 elementary school kids for this two-week day-camp. They worked on Braille and cane skills all the time, but also learned to make their own lunches, traveled on the light rail and bus, went canoeing and rock climbing, and gained a peer group of other blind kids.

That was one of the first lessons of the first day of summer for Confidence Camp kids this morning.

“If someone asks you what your backpack looks like, what are you going to tell them?” the lesson continued.

Yes, Monday began with learning for the 10 5 to 12-year-olds. It went on from there, including making lunches, and there will be plenty more lessons in independence and fun over the next two weeks. Lots of fun too – their day ended with a trip to the pool for a swim. Now that’s summer!

And then there were the 23 teenagers in our Earn & Learn and College Prep programs in their first day of classes. they will be with us for 8 weeks, including a trip to the National Federation of the Blind 2018 Convention in Orlando!

Swimming, paddling, rock climbing – every afternoon there’s something fun going on at Confidence Camp. In the morning – the learning looks just as fun! Learning to use the microwave, making lunch … and always traveling with white canes and taking the light rail and the bus somewhere fun … like horseback riding today!

By 9 Monday morning the commotion in the lobby was reaching a crescendo. Fifteen Confidence Campers were arriving for the first of three weeks of learning blindness skills, having fun and yes – becoming more confident as small blind people! The commotion arose from parents dropping the campers off, connecting or reconnecting with their teachers and the other kids.

Tryna Boyd Pratt has directed Confidence Camp for 16 years running, and it wasn’t long before she was assigning three of the older kids to do the grocery shopping. Of course, for kids between the ages of 5 and 11, a teacher goes with them to the supermarket, but their job was to get a shoppers’ assistant and get all the items on the list themselves – a real grown-up skill! By the way, that list was dictated to them and written in Braille!

Here’s to three more weeks of learning, fun, growth and CONFIDENCE!