Summer Camp Roundup
We cannot believe that summer camps are half way through!
We have had so much fun with our multidisciplinary camps:
Students have danced, sang, acted, and done visual art each day.
Here are a few highlights and photos from our past five weeks of camp:
Tap and Hip Hop With Miss Jessica
Miss Jessica taught active tap and hip-hop sessions, going through the fundamentals of each style to lead to creative experimentation in the camp. The older groups have learned a variety of different tap steps, including a "Buffalo", which they learned to do as they traveled across the room.
Each day campers participate in 'Hip Hop Challenges': are complicated movement challenges done in the hip hop style. Miss Jessica might call out: 'Arms crossed, legs crossed', 'sway your hips' and the students would have to complete it to the best of their ability. Shown below are 'zulu turns'.
We also enjoyed playing the camp favorite game 'Four Corners'! In this game there are four colored dots placed in the four corners of the room. Miss Jessica plays music and the dancers move around. When Miss Jessica stops the music campers have three seconds to decide on a corner to stand in and she closes her eyes. Miss Jessica then calls out a corner and all of the students in that corner are eliminated. The campers continue playing until they have a winner!
Miss Mimi teaches art every day
For our Lion King themed week, full day campers created their own modern versions of lions using different shapes and paper. Check out the different examples of their interpretations:
In week three our preschool group focused on colors, which helped Miss Mimi teach them color theory and mood in their art classes. They combined paper collage, coloring, and paint to create color boards. The best part was learning which primary colors (red, yellow, blue) to mix to create secondary colors (orange, green, and purple)!
See below some other amazing projects created by our campers!
Preschool Camp
Our half day campers started their days off with yoga and imaginary flying trips around the world. They listened to stories and experimented with music beats and tactile instruments promoting motor skills each day.
Musical Theater
Taught by Anne Brummel, Lisa Capps, and Mari Linder!
In Miss Anne's Musical Theater class the campers learned about showing emotions through movement, dance, and play. Theater games are a great way to learn new techniques while still having fun. Participants play games like "Statues" where they have to strike and hold a pose based on a theme or character. They also did "Emotion Walks" where they moved around the room showing different emotions while interacting with their fellow campers.
In Miss Lisa’s Musical Theater class in week five, campers worked on a Broadway style dance to 'If I Only Had a Heart' from The Wizard of Oz. Miss Lisa taught them theater games and worked on the physicalization of the Tin Man, exploring through movement what it would be like to be made of tin. During the final Friday performance students utilized props from art class to make the song come to life.
In week 4 full day students honed their Zip-Zap-Zop skills throughout the week with Miss Mari. Zip, Zap, Zop is an energy game in which students throw focus to one another in a circle by pointing to someone in the circle and saying 'zip, zap, and zop' (in that order). The goal is for the group to fall into a rhythm and for no mistakes to be made. Mistakes include saying a word in the wrong order, saying a word when the energy has not been passed to you, or not paying attention and missing your turn to pass the energy. It was so fun to see students improve throughout the week, tentatively playing the game on Monday and being 'Zip, Zap, Zop' whizzes by Friday.
Ballet with Miss Lee and Miss Laura
In Miss Laura's ballet class campers learned the different ballet positions, plies, releves and worked across the floor. They learned a group ballet routine to classical music that the campers loved to watch each Friday. One camper said her favorite part of ballet was pretending she had strings attached to her body, which let her lift her legs and body tall as she performed her moves!
In Miss Lee’s ballet classes dancers worked on building core strength through daily abdominal exercises. They learned ballet vocabulary and enjoyed practicing their vocab skills taking turns calling out ballet moves and having the class do the moves.
Music
In music classes with Mari, Allie, and Michi campers have learned rhythm and two part harmonies, working on songs from different shows each week. In music classes students were exposed to the basics of rhythm and dynamics, discussing terms like piano (playing quietly), forte (playing loudly), and crescendo (gradual increasing in loudness). Of course, they played plenty of games too!
We have had a blast so far at camp but we are not finished yet! We have four more weeks of camp and only a few spots left in each one. Call 201-683-9100 to see if there is a spot left in your requested week!
