Danville Second Day Report

Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Danville Trinity Church Reading Camp

To continue yesterday's breaking point, at the Community Arts Center all the kids made magic wands and went through the center to look at the exhibits. Everyone was really excited about their wands!

The second day of Trinity's Reading Camp began with the very unique Judy Robertson in resplendent dress reading from The World According to Humphrey after breakfast. During the reading she paused and asked questions, and if the kids could name nocturnal animals – bats were a popular contribution! After the reading Judy opened her purse to show the curious its contents, which included a Michael Jackson glove, a black one with red polka dots from her high-school days, a beautiful lace prayer-cap, a package of four hand-decorated Band-Aids, and a lot of pictures. She says most of the stuff in her purse has been given to her over the years, but even her purse didn't compare to her outfit – a colorful striped dress, lots and lots of jewelry, yellow plaid stockings and huge colorful striped sunglasses from Australia.

Judy was Madame Trelawney last week for Vacation Bible School at Trinity, and the Harry Potter theme continues into Reading Camp. The remnants of Diagon Alley are next to the Writing station, brick and stone wallpaper remains on the walls, and everywhere you look there are owls and electric candles. What better than a popular series like Harry Potter to encourage readers? Even some of the themes in the different station are wizards and magic, most notably Reading Comprehension.

After everyone had seen the contents of Judy's purse, it was time for a group picture. Everyone took a lot of group pictures after a lot of work getting lined up so everyone could be seen, quite a few of us standing on the pew against the wall, and missing a couple of people in the first pictures. For the last group of pictures we all had to smile while we tried to answer one of today's visitors, Bungee's, question: "What is brown and sticky?" The answer was "a stick!" What could be stickier than a stick?

We learned that we had some new people today who had to be assigned to groups, and that the rotation strategy would be different for the rest of the week. Yesterday each group went to the station on the list, but from today on everyone goes to the next room over to make the traffic lighter and less confusing. The traffic today was indeed lighter, except after breaks when Victoria had to organize the chaos!

Everyone worked hard in the Learning Centers today. The kids aren't as reluctant to read as you might think – some even kept a copy of the book Tammy Jones used in Reading Strategies today, The Twits by Roald Dahl, to finish reading! After the Learning Centers were finished it was time to swim; everyone changed and headcounts were done and off the campers went! When they came back to Trinity to change out of their swimming gear all the campers were given disposable cameras to use on today's field trip – the Central Kentucky Wildlife Refuge!

At the Nature Center the kids saw and took pictures of all kinds of things – cicadas, cicadas, and cicadas. They even saw the things that are supposed to be at the Nature Center! There were dragonflies, black and white ones and blue ones, frogs smaller than bugs, and a stuffed fox! They had a long hike with an accompanying orchestra of lots of loud cicadas, and later a discussion on ranches – the farm-type of ranch and the salad dressing! There was a detour back to the pool because one of the campers forgot their shorts, but with shorts collected everyone returned to Trinity for pick-up by their parents and put-up of their cameras. On Friday all the pictures will be developed for everyone to take home.

Everyone is excited for tomorrow, when we'll have Learning Centers and more swimming, then a trip to Mary Robin Spoonamore's photography studio and another author visit!

-Written by Britney Kingery, newcomer to Trinity Episcopal Church, Danville, KY