The idea of letting the children "look at the tree" refers to a group of girls who were walking ahead of their counselor, and stopped to look at a carving in a tree. Soon enough, the entire group was stopped and looking at the tree. When the girls' counselor arrived at that point she said to them, "It's just a tree girls, we've got lots of them... let's go to tennis."
Why couldn't she just let them look at the tree? In fact, she could have joined them for 20 seconds, said, "Hey, what are you guys looking at? Cool carving... I wonder whose initials those are? (pause, show interest) Okay, let's go to tennis, girls!"
This is about picking your battles and being smart with your relationship with the children in your group.
The balance between "Authority Figure" and "Buddy" is often very difficult for staff.
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