4岁的Lawrence今年暑假在洛杉矶上了两周幼儿园夏令营，爸爸对此感慨万千。（翻译见文末）

“See you next summer Ms. Marissa!”  Lawrence said to his Camp Leader during the last day of the event.  I was a bit surprised to hear my son spoke English so clearly, so freely.  My wife and I hesitated when we thought about sending our four and half year-old son Lawrence to a two-week summer camp in Los Angeles.   Not only because of his young age, but also his limited English skills.  When I say ‘limited’, I meant he could barely count to 20 in English.  At the same time, we heard a lot of good things about having summer camps in the USA and how kids all loved it upon their returns.  We wanted to give Lawrence a chance to be ‘independent’ for the first time in his young life and be able to learn English while ‘having fun’ instead of studying in a boring classroom.  It ended up being the best decision we’ve ever made.

The traditional view of a summer camp as a woody place with hiking, canoeing, and campfires is changing, Lawrence's camp school offered a wide variety of specialized activities.   Performing arts, music, magic, horse riding, language learning, mathematics, just to name a few.  Most of the activities and classes are catered to beginners, offering Lawrence the opportunity to try new things or to learn a new skill.  In my son’s case, he not only learned art and sports, but also English at the same time since all of the teachers and fellow classmates spoke only English.  Kids can adapt the language environment at an extra-ordinary speed.  He learned more English in that two weeks than his entire semester in Shanghai school.

Lawrence's camp had baseball activities each afternoon.  Americans are known for having good team sports and you could tell the reason just from observing the way they train kindergarten kids.   Not only do they teach the kids how to ‘hit the baseball’, but more importantly the coaches focus on helping the kids gain confidence and improve their ‘teaming’ abilities.  Lawrence was shy during his first 3 days, he seldom spoke to other students.  However, most of the American kids are extremely outgoing, they would reach out to Lawrence with open arms.  In matter of days, Lawrence was able to play with other kids as if they have known each other for a long time.  During the second week, Lawrence’s English became ‘natural’, something he could never learn from sitting in a classroom with foreign teacher in Shanghai.  Let's be honest, kids simply learn better and faster from other kids, not the teachers, no matter how good the English teach is.  He ‘blossomed’ because he connected with other kids who share the same interests and bonding.

On the flight back to Shanghai, Lawrence told me at least three times “Dad, can I do this again next year? Please?”  Summer camp, whether it was magical, fun, or adventurous, ALWAYS forms the strongest memories for kids.  Research says that camp memories are stronger than other memories because they carry salience, an emotional importance.  These memories are Lawrence's own memories, unique to his experiences – not common family memories nor common school memories.  These new experiences are growth experiences that will influence my son long after the camp.

    “See you next summer Ms. Marissa！” 临走的最后一天，Lawrence对班级的老师说。当时我很惊讶他能够如此自信和自如地说英文。起初，我和我太太对于送4岁半的Lawrence入学洛杉矶当地幼儿园有一些顾虑，一来是担心他年纪比较小，更重要的是担心语言障碍让他丢失了与老师或者其他小朋友交流的自信。毕竟，他的英语水平只能从1数到20。不过，我也听闻美国的教学环境能够让孩子们更加活泼开朗，很多孩子去了第一次之后每年都想回到美国的学校持续学习。我和我的太太想给Lawrence一个“独立”的机会，并且希望他能够在快乐的环境下学习英语，而不是在一个枯燥的课堂里学习英语。不过没想到，这个决定成为了我们最好的决定。

    Lawrence所去的幼儿园设置了很多课程，包括画画、音乐、语言、数学，甚至还有幼儿骑马课程。这些课程深入简出，给了孩子们很好的机会去尝试新的领域。对于我儿子来说，这些课程不仅让他学到了课程本身的技能，而且也是很好的英语浸润。因为不论是他的老师还是他的同学，英语都是第一语言。孩子们在全英语的环境中，英语提高的速度很惊人。他在这两个月中学习的英语，比他在上海整个学期学到的更多。

    Lawrence的学校每天下午都有棒球课。美国的团队运动************，在观察了教练的训练方式之后，我们得到了答案。教练们不仅仅告诉孩子们如何去“打到棒球”，更重要的是帮助孩子们建立自信和增强团队间的合作能力。头三天的学习中，Lawrence很拘谨。老师反应他很少跟同伴对话，不过老师也对我们说，这是很正常的。当地的小朋友非常热情，大部分小朋友都主动与Lawrence讲话。过了几天之后，他慢慢地和几个伙伴一起玩了。两个礼拜之后，我们发现Lawrence说英语越来越自然，时不时地能够自己蹦出英文单词，或者跳出一句简单的句子。这是他在国内学习过程中从未发生过的。我们不能否认，对于孩子来说，从同伴那里学习语言会比从老师那里学习语言更快也更易接受。Lawrence的突破是因为他在同伴中找到了共同的兴趣和联系。

    当我们飞回上海的时候，Lawrence问了我三遍，“爸爸，我们明年可以再回来吗？”美式教育，不知道有何魔力，总能够成为孩子们记忆中的美好。我想，这段经历，将成为他最宝贵、最特别的经历之一。不仅是家庭记忆，也不只是学校记忆，而是他独立完成的一场完美探险。希望这段记忆，能在他的心里种下一颗小小的种子。