Week 1 - Circus & Carnival Games, July 7 to 11
Preschool/Kindergarten
Boys and girls, children of all ages, welcome to the Early Learning Community Big Top! We look forward to seeing you at the circus. Campers will express their inner performer while they dress up and discover the art of juggling with scarves. We will create a big top collage, use cotton candy puffy paint and design an animal mask for the end of week parade. We will also use our imaginations to explore the excitement of the circus through dramatic play, constructing simple carnival games out of recycled materials. Step right up and join the fun!
Elementary
Come one, come all - this week at camp is your ticket to surprises and delights as we plan our first summer camp carnival and circus. Our elementary cohort will be our ringmasters as they plan the carnival and circus performances that campers and their families will get to enjoy Friday afternoon. Be amazed as they hone their circus skills at juggling, clowning, balancing stunts, and more! Be dazzled by the carnival games, treats, and prizes they brainstorm, design, and create over the course of the week! Whether your child likes to be a performer out front or a games engineer behind the scenes, there is something for everyone.
Week 2 - Puppetry & Music, July 14 to 18
Preschool/Kindergarten
It’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights, it’s time to make some puppets for our puppet show tonight! We will create our own stick puppets for Readers Theater retellings of classic fairy and folktales to bring the stories to life. Campers will craft characters of their own design out of a variety of media - craft sticks, paper bags, socks, spoons and other recycled materials. We will invent stories of our own, performing in our puppet theater using our large collection of hand and finger puppets. Our younger campers will also get to be the audience at the elementary campers’ puppet show on Friday. We’ll round out the week singing songs and playing instruments with local music educator Geneva Houx.
Elementary
Dueling knights, furry monsters, hilarious marionettes… Our elementary campers will study many different ways to add character and movement as they build more complex puppets with rods, strings, and articulated joints. On Tuesday, campers will take a field trip to see musician and puppeteer Red Yarn perform at Anna & Abby’s Yard. This will give us inspiration for our focus the rest of the week, creating a series of original performances involving camper-created puppets and music, with the help of Ms. Julie and local music educator Geneva Houx.
Week 3 - Science & Water Play, July 21 to 25
Preschool/Kindergarten
Buckle up for an exciting week of experiments and investigations! We will design cozy contraptions to keep our eggs safe as we drop them from our play structure and harness the power of the sun to make pizza in our solar ovens. We will whip up a batch of homemade slime to squish and squelch, and test out pulleys, ramps, and gears with our Lego Duplo STEAM Park. We’ll fly our favorite stuffies across the sky with an ELC Camp favorite, Stuffy Zipline, and launch water rockets as high as we can. We’ll cap off the week with a day of water play to celebrate the end of summer camp together.
Elementary
Water, water everywhere, and summer is the perfect time to learn more about it! As scientists we’ll conduct experiments with surface tension, making our own water strider “bugs” and testing various bubble recipes to figure out how to make the biggest, longest-lasting bubbles. Campers will learn about ancient water inventions such as Archimedes Screw and tinker with materials to make their own water wheels. We’ll make boats and test them outside in the Cedar Classroom, an ELC Camp tradition, and we’ll make unique creations with our soap boat carving. Capping off the week, we’ll hold an outside water “field day” with tons of games and homemade water toys, plus our many sprinklers and reusable water balloons!