Week Three at the Y!

 

          Hey parents and campers!  This week Discovery Camp had a week of Holidaze Craze.  They celebrated different holidays each day, and today they are having a Halloween Party!  Camp MVP enjoyed a wide range of sports from skating around at the roller rink to hitting the birdie in badminton.  Leadership Academy learned how to effectively communicate with each other and how to work together to accomplish different tasks.  Specialty Camp, called Around the World, visited Ireland and China, created art from different countries, and took two trips to round off the week’s activities. 

            Week Three’s theme for Discovery Camp was “Holidaze Craze”.  First, campers celebrated their “Un-Birthdays” on Tuesday with a huge birthday party.  Campers made cards, played “pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey”, hit a piñata, played musical chairs, and shared tasty birthday cupcakes with friends to finish off the day.  Explorer Morgan, 8 years old, explained that celebrating her “Un-Birthday” was her favorite part of the week.  “My favorite holiday was my ‘Un-Birthday’.  I really liked playing ‘pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey’ and I loved the cupcakes!”  Wednesday, Discovery Campers visited Atsion Lake, where they splashed around in the waters of the State Park.  Voyager Counselor Dave tells what his favorite part of the week was:  “We got to take the kids to the lake.  It was fun, and something different and exciting.”  Thursday, campers celebrated Thanksgiving with silly turkey games, like egg races between counselors and trying to find which “turkey” (counselor) laid the eggs.  Today, the campers got in their Halloween costumes for the big Halloween Party!

            This week, Camp MVP played many sports including badminton, football, and goofy games.  They enjoyed working together to win the game for their team.  On badminton day, counselors decided to shake things up by combining the sport with four square to make “Badminton Four Square”.  On Wednesday, Camp MVP headed to the Woodbridge Sports Complex to practice their skating skills.  The campers rolled around in roller blades and roller skates while jamming to the music and cosmic lights.  Counselor Hannah said that “the skating trip was the best thing that happened this week because it was fun watching both the counselors and campers trying a new activity.”  The counselors set a great example by not only helping the Princeton Y campers, but any other child that needed help.  On Thursday, MVP kicked off with an official, competitive, all-camp game of football officiated by the counselors.  “Football was very fun to play.  I like coming to camp in the morning to practice playing the different sports with my friends,” said twelve-year-old camper Viggy.  The counselors and campers had fun interacting with each other in their competitive games.  Today, they will be playing goofy games and acting silly with fellow campers.  These “goofy games” entail playing fun, crazy, and random games to finish off their exciting week. 

            Around the World was the Specialty Camp of the week.  Campers made passports and their own countries on Tuesday.  They really put their imaginations to work while created the countries.  Eleven-year-old Jamie described her group’s inspiration for its “Angry Bird Island”.  “At first we couldn’t decide what to do, and then we decided to make [the island] after a video game.  It was really cool and fun to make.”  Wednesday was a trip day!  Campers visited the Princeton Art Museum to study artists from around the world.  Ireland and China were visited on Thursday.  Campers learned how to make origami and then created their own special pots-of-gold with a rainbows made out of handprints.  Later, Around the World played the Irish-Scottish game, where two events took place:  “Heave Ho” and “Shoot for the Noon”.  In “Heave Ho”, the children used a spatula to throw a lunch bag over a clothesline.  In “Shoot for the Noon”, campers flipped an unsharpened pencil to try to land the eraser as close to the 12 o’ clock position as possible. 

            Leadership this week was centered on good communication skills.  The campers did exercises that consisted of being blindfolded and leading each other around to the other side of an obstacle course.  They also did an exercise where each person had a pipe and had to get a marble through each pipe without touching the others.  These exercises taught the Leaders how to get through obstacles by working together.  Team bonding was very important to the Academy this week.  It was important for them to become close with one another not only because there was a new group of campers this week, but also to get through the activities.  Leadership Counselor Matt described why he enjoyed this week so much.  “Having a new group was a lot of fun.  We get a new group every two weeks, so it’s really refreshing to see some new faces.”  Today, the Leadership Academy went to the National Constitution Center to see the Washington Exhibit.  There, they learned about the great leaders of our nation and what it takes to become one.

             Next week, Camp MVP will be playing sports like baseball, ultimate Frisbee, and Quiddich.  Then, there will be a BBQ on Friday!  The specialty camp of next week will be Super Science, where campers do different experiments everyday and learn about the fundamentals of chemistry.   Discovery Camp will be Going Green or Bust.  The Princeton Y is partnering with NJPIRG Energy Service Corps to help teach campers how to go green and keep our Earth clean!