Are you looking for an awesome day camp options to improve soccer skills? We were asked to give Challenger International Soccer Camp a try and my boys were happy to comply. Read on to find out what we thought about these fun soccer day camps.
Challenger International Soccer Camp
Challenger Soccer Camps feature international coaches teaching popular elements from both British soccer and TetraBrazil. Our coach, Coach David grew up in Germany and spent his summers in Britain, so he had experience with soccer styles from both countries.
Full Day and Half Day Camps
Challenger Soccer Camps offer a variety of camp options including half day camps, full day camps and tiny tykes (for kids 3-5). Our camp was a half day option which meant 3 hours of soccer camp each day and is geared towards kids ages 5- 16.
Our camp was on the smaller side with only 10 kids enrolled. We had a wide age range of 5-13 though and I really impressed with how the coach differentiated activities for the little kids compared with the older ones. There were also times when they played together, including scrimmaging at the end of each practice.
Soccer Coaching & Skill Development
The kids played a variety of games and activities designed to help their soccer skills in a fun way. Games where they practiced passing the ball to teammates, dribbling the ball down the field, receiving the ball and scoring goals. They also learned a lot about teamwork and how important it was on a team to work together.
Soccer Camp Homework?
The coach gave the kids homework on a few nights. And it wasn’t practicing soccer skills (although I am sure he’d be happy if they did that as well). Their homework was to help build up their interest and knowledge of soccer culture. Despite the global nature of soccer, it just doesn’t have the insanely huge fan base here in America compared to other sports here.
The coach had divided the kids into two teams on the first day and each team picked what real football club they would represent. Quinn’s team was Liverpool and Elliot’s team was Manchester United. Their first night of homework was to learn interesting facts about their assigned soccer team. My kids have had very limited experience with soccer so encouraging them to research their ‘teams’ was great.
The second night of homework was to draw their team logo. It was challenging but engaging as the studied the team emblems and attempted to recreate them with colored pencils. The last night of homework was to create a costume of a super fan for their team. Ahhh, costumes are my favorite.
Liverpool and Manchester United Super Fans
The key was that they had to create the costumes themselves. Normally, I do the bulk of the costume design and DIY but for this assignment, I could only make suggestions. I couldn’t make any of it for them. You know my kids had this homework in the bag though. They’ve seen how I modified plain clothing to create costumes before and I have lots of random craft materials for them to use.
Soccer Fan Costumes
Quinn complained a little that Elliot had it easy because the nickname for Manchester United is Red Devils. Elliot was quite creative modifying our Fox in Socks costume hoodie into black devil horns. Then he created a tail with cardboard and flexible piping wrapped in duct tape. His pitchfork is just cardboard wrapped in more duct tape. Quinn settled on just a super fan, spelling out his allegiance on his clothing. Also using duct tape to spell out Liverpool FC and #1 on a black hat and white t-shirt. He also painted a big sign on a piece of poster board.
Challenger Soccer Camp
My kids loved the Challenger soccer camp. They were happy it was 3 hours each day, (initially I was worried it would be too long) and were sad when camp ended on the last day. They made friends at camp, they learned new skills, they had fun and they can’t wait to play soccer again. We will definitely be signing up for a Challenger International Soccer Camp next year. Heck, Elliot wants to sign up for another camp this summer.
Thank you Challenger soccer camp for allowing us to review your program. There are camps just about everywhere, including near you. Everyone who signs up gets a soccer bowl and t-shirt and if you sign up 30 days in advance you also can receive a replica game jersey while supplies last. There’s still plenty of time this summer to experience one of Challenger’s awesome summer soccer camps! Find a list of Challenger Soccer camps near you.
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