We made it through day one of Camp Clover!
It went soooo well.
I'm feeling much less stressed than I was last night when I wrote my first Camp Clover post. We arrived at the library bright and early and brought all our equipment in. Our teen teachers arrived early and the next thing you know, our kids started arriving.
We introduced ourselves and then, without realizing it, three hours passed and it was noon. We ended up having nine kids, going into third grade through eighth grade. All were extremely respectful and excited to be there.
So a little background on the point of the camp this week. Our camp objectives are:
Community pride
Digital media production
Storytelling and journalism
Our main project is having the kids interview someone from their community, using iPads to record the interview. From there, they'll choose a 30-60 second audio clip as their foundation and add photos and video on top of that clip. Together, we'll make a 10 minute video of all their interviews.
Neat, right? (I sure think so)
To get to know each other better (belonging is a core component of 4H and something we feel strongly in establishing quickly and early) we played a good old round of human bingo. Essentially, ask your neighbors questions that have been laid out on a bingo board. First to black out their board wins!
Well, everyone wins, but that's besides the point.
From there, we jumped into a discussion about community and ended up with two very interesting definitions (see photo).
Especially after discussing what community is for a semester in Community Engagement, I was intrigued by the definitions the kids came up with. I think what was evident was that these kids come from strong communities, even if they are not fully aware of it right now. I was also throughly impressed by our teen teachers, who led the small groups and did such an amazing job at asking questions that got the kids talking and thinking critically.
Literally my favorite photo of the day.
From there (and after a well-deserved snack), we jumped into how to conduct an interview and what sorts of questions we could ask someone. Again, I was impressed by how these kids think and the questions they came up with. We tacked their two sets of brainstormed questions to the wall and asked the kids to look at both pages and pick their top five questions they wanted to ask.
Brief iPad recorder learning session. It was a little surreal to hear my voice echoing over and over as the kids played their test recording of me explaining how the app worked. The kids thought it was HILARIOUS.
We ended the day with what I think was our best activity: iMovie trailers. I just can't get over HOW GREAT this feature of iMovie is. It's the best combo of structure with the type of shots paired with the freedom and flexibility for tons of creativity.
From our previous experience with kids at UNCC, an example trailer would have been helpful. The kids chose this one...
Never has a room been so quiet. Also, this trailer is too much for me to handle. I have to go see this movie for the simple fact there will be so many puns and wordplays I can't miss out on.
With this in mind, we let the kids loose to make their own. Our theme was: THE LIBRARY and boy did the groups have fun with that. We gave each group an iPad Mini and they took off. In the 30 or so minutes we gave, they couldn't quite finish the movie, so it will be a project we'll allow time for each day. As Clair (co-teacher) and I walked around the library watching the teen teachers and the kids tape and direct their own trailer, we knew this was going to be a great week of camp. You could feel the energy between the kids and through their laughter and smiles, could visibly tell they were having fun.
We let them loose at noon and are excited to see how their interviews go when they return to camp tomorrow. Stay tuned for more tomorrow!