Our campers had a blast in our first LIFT2Enrich Virtual Summer Camp Luau. We had two weeks of fun games, music, and videos as we learned about the islands of Hawaii. We didn’t have the luxury of meeting face to face, so I have to admit, I was a little concerned that our 1.5-hour online camp would be a snooze fest. But the kids assured us that this was not the case. Packed with fun, excitement, and excellent writing, I’d call our first virtual luau camp a resounding success.
We used Zoom to conduct our classes, and one of the first things we learned was that giving students the option to text their reply in the chat box proved to be a clever way to receive immediate feedback, thus avoiding the dreaded crickets when students are asked to share their thoughts.
Here’s some of what the campers had to say about the class:
“It’s really fun, and it passes so quickly.”
“Super gooooooooooooooooooooooooddd”
“It’s nice.”
“Awesome”
“Love writing.”
“On a scale from one to ten, I would give it a ten.”
“I am happy that we did not only do writing the whole time and that we did fun things.”
“Camp is amazing.”
“It was fun and a great experience. Looking forward to coming again tomorrow.”
We started class with a fun ice breaker, then we learned a new writing concept each day, including genre, story elements, plot, and dialogue. For our writing project, the students were asked to select a genre and write a story based on the prompt:
It Happened at the Luau
The stories were written in a variety of genres: adventure, mystery, fantasy, and even horror. With beautiful Hawaiian music playing in the background, students went to work crafting their stories. Our week of Camp Luau flew by.
We want to thank our sponsors for providing our students with an opportunity to connect with other campers and hone their writing skills. We had a culturally diverse class of over 30 students, including African American, Serbian, Asian, White American, and African campers. On the very last day of open registration, Clair, a foster mother, contacted me and asked if her two foster kids could participate. They were lagging in their education and needed help writing. We were pleased to welcome them in our class, even sending them a small care package of school supplies. She wrote, “Thank you so much. We did receive the care package. You’re the BEST! Thank you so much for all you did for our foster children. God bless! Clair.”
We are looking forward to our final summer camp where students will learn how technology can be used to improve writing.