Danville Reading Camp ... everyone!

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Danville 4th & 5th day report

Thursday/Friday June 12/13, 2008
Trinity, Danville Reading Camp

Whew! The past two days at Trinity's Reading Camp have been busy, busy, busy! Yesterday morning we had Keith Dunn in again for more music at breakfast, which included a new Harry Potter song! Some of the words in the songs only had the first letter, and everyone had to guess what the word was. The kids loved it.

It was all business as usual at camp yesterday morning: a reading from The World According to Humphrey, explanation from Victoria at how the day would go, and that the schedule was bumped fifteen minutes ahead for the big field trip in the afternoon. The Learning Centers were great, and everyone worked hard. In the Phonics/Decoding station with Ginny and Neil all the campers worked on vowel sounds.

After lunch and swimming, all the campers hurried back to change for the big field trip: a walk to Centre College to see Keith Dunn's Magical Chemistry Show! It was great and everyone had a lot of fun. They saw exploding balloons, a "sad" ball in comparison to a bouncing ball, a needle put through an inflated balloon and "elephant toothpaste!" I'm still not quite sure what that is, but all the campers said they wish they could use it instead of their regular toothpastes! The last thing they did was make – and eat! – their own ice cream. One of the campers says "It tasted like that Bluebell homemade ice cream."

Yesterday's ice cream was peanuts compared to what at least one kid in each group told me in the Writing station today: they were most excited to walk to later in the afternoon. As soon as one kid said it, all the other campers were eager to let me know how much they agreed!

After the Learning Centers, lunch, and swimming everyone came back to Trinity's fireside room for a slideshow of all the photographs from our visit to Mary Robin's photography studio. All the campers got to see the individual and group photographs and were very pleased!

What they didn't know was that the big event of today wouldn't be the ice cream: it would be what happened right before, the visit from the Humane Society! A very nice woman came and talked to the campers about how important it is to spay and neuter your dogs and cats, and gave tips on how to pick out what kind of pet is best for you. Then she brought in two tiny little puppies for everyone to see! Everyone got to pet them, including the adults. After she left, the wrap-up activity for Trinity Danville's Reading Camp was the last thing on the agenda: walking to Baskin-Robbins! The kids had a great time; who wouldn't at the ice-cream shop?

All the campers go home today with a bag prepared just for them. In the lime-green Reading Camp tote bags are their journals, a copy of David Anderson's Sometimes I Get So Angry, books, and the photographs they took with their own cameras.

With Trinity's blog, we wrap up with what one camper answered when I asked if he liked this year's Reading Camp or last year's better:

"I had to like this year better, it's my last year. First I got confused 'cause my mom said 'you can only go to basketball camp two years,' and I was like 'no, not that!' and she said no, I could only go two years to Reading Camp, and I was like 'no, not that either!'"

We're all sad it's the end of our week-long camp, but it's only a year 'til the next!

Everyone loves afternoon swimming time

Reading during ... snack time?

What do you do if you're falling in love with reading at Reading Camp? You might take the book you've just recently been reading in one of your learning centers and read it amongst the organized chaos of snack time. What a wonderful world of books awaits you!

Phonics and Decoding learning centers

Versatile Volunteers

Trinity members J.P. and Jane Brantley have volunteered at Reading Camp in several ways this week. In addition to serving as experienced guides for the field trip to the Central Kentucky Wildlife Refuge (especially noting the poison ivy "If it has three leaves, let it be!"), they also dressed as the Dursleys to read Chapter 4 of the Read Aloud book one morning.

Owl mail, time to go home for the day...

Morning sing-a-long

Sallie the Reading Dog makes Pleasure Reading even more fun

Making our own books in the writing center

Wildlife Refuge Center exploration

Learning Reading Comprehension can be fun!

Snack time

Not your brother-in-law's Wildlife Farm

After a morning filled with learning centers, camp directors plan field trips for students to enjoy in the afternoon. On the way to the Central Kentucky Wildlife Refuge field trip, two campers were discussing the trip out of to the "Wildlife Farm."

Camper 1: "Man, where are you taking us? We're all out in the country."

Camper 2: "Weren't you listening? We're going to the Wildlife Farm."

Camper 1: "My brother-in-law... I have two brother-in-laws, but one of them has a farm, for cows, but he calls it a ranch."

Camper 2: "A ranch? Well that's stupid, ranch is what you put on salad."

Danville Third Day report

Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Danville Trinity Reading Camp

Today we start out with what's been going on in Ginny Birney's Writing station. You'll remember from Monday that everyone made journals, and now we know what they're writing in them! Below is an example of what the kids wrote yesterday.

My name is _____.
In the summer I went to Reading Camp.
I like to read at Reading Camp.
Every day we go swimming unless it rains.
We went to the Community Arts Center and made wands on Monday.
My wand was black and gold with glitter.

They're doing great, aren't they? They could take my blogging job, these young writers! And remember they get to write in their very own handmade journals.

This morning we had Keith Dunn back with his guitar to wake everyone up for breakfast, and today's breakfast was a lively repeat of Monday's. The kids sang "She'll be Comin' 'round the Mountain," "Michael Finnegan," and "Big Blue Frog" with Keith, and repeated on their own the popular bananas song from yesterday! Then Victoria explained what's going on today: the kids will get to swim for a little longer today, then come back to Trinity and change back into their regular clothes for a trip to the photography studio, and hurry back for another author visit!

Also announced was our new teacher for the Pleasure Reading station – Trinity's own organist, Vicki Bell. She let me in on what's happening in Pleasure Reading: the door wasn't closed to keep people out, but to keep Sallie, Father Rob and Victoria's greyhound, in the room! In Pleasure Reading they read out loud to Sallie, and have 15-20 minutes of silent reading, and if they're reading the same book they'll talk about it for the last few minutes before they change stations!

This afternoon everyone had lunch and special cookies before they went swimming – the cookies were a gift from one of the camper's mothers! After eating, off to swimming the campers went.

Immediately after swimming everyone came back to Trinity to change their clothes and walk to Mary Robin's photography studio, where she and her assistant talked about how to use reflections to increase or decrease light, and then everyone had a big group picture!

After the photography studio we hurried back to Trinity for today's other special event – an author visit! The author of Sometimes I Get So Angry, David A. Anderson, came to see us and tell us about his book before reading it aloud. He talked about writing and how hard it is to get a book published, and that he published this book by himself so his children could read it while they were still kids. He said his inspiration for the book came from when he was doing research about criminals, and figured out that most crimes happen because people don't handle their anger well. He decided he wanted to try to help people learn how to let anger out in better ways, so he wrote his book! In his book he mentions all kinds of ways to handle getting mad – taking a walk, listing things that make you happy, and singing songs! The illustrator for his book was a local Danville artist, Paul Sirimongkhon, and all the kids loved the book and the illustrations!

Everybody had a great day today, and they've been working hard on their reading skills and playing even harder. We're all looking forward to tomorrow!

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

Another way to learn Reading comprehension

"Happy faces, big smiles, laughter and lots of hard work. That was the setting at the Danville Reading Camp today. No one was wasting his or her time, but rather listening intently to the questions and giving a large variety of answers pertaining to Harry Potter's first book. Why they were even doing slight-of-hand tricks with $1 bills. It was a sneaky way of teaching and oh so effective. This is reading comprehension at it's best. So refreshing and so very different from the classroom.

This is READING CAMP when READING ROCKS!!!"

-Margaret Hill, Reading Camp volunteer camp director for the Cathedral Domain Reading Camp who visited the Danville Reading Camp

Wand making at the Community Arts Center

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

Why I do Reading Camp - by C.C. Johnson

"I have a passion for it. I know through my work in prison ministry that I see the other end of the results of those that don't learn how to read. I know a woman I've worked with in the prisons recently that has been in tears because she can't read the workbooks and the journaling they do in the prisons. There's no one there to teach them how to read. She just couldn't read. It dooms people if they can't read in our society. You can't go to work in a factory anymore if you can't read.

And I fall in love with children, how can you not? I believe all God's children on the earth belong to all of us. Reading opens a magic door and no matter what you like, someone has written a book about it."

-Veteran Volunteer C.C. Johnson has been serving with Reading Camp since its beginning with the Cathedral Domain camp in 2002. She helped part-time with the Domain camp at its beginning and then joined the Danville team when they had their first Reading Camp. In 2006 she volunteered at three Reading Camps. In 2007 she did four Reading Camps. This week in Danville is the first of many weeks of Reading Camp for C.C. this summer.

Danville going great!

Danville camp is going wonderfully this morning. The children are entering their last Reading Centers for the day before we have lunch, go swimming, and head out for a hike in the woods.

In addition to the volunteers listed on the Danville staff here, please add these Danville Reading Camp volunteers to your prayer list for the week:

Judy Robertson from Trinity, Danville is dressed as the Groundhog lady today for our read aloud book, The World According to Humphrey by Betty Birney
Ginny Birney from Trinity, Danville is working in the writing center
Vicki Bell from Trinity, Danville
Britney Kingery from Trinity, Danville
Ashley Kingery from Trinity, Danville
Tammy Jones from Trinity, Danville
Sarah Marletta from Lexington, KY
Claire Slocum from Mountain Home, NC
Phoebe Russ from Trinity, Danville

Danville First Day Report

Monday, June 9, 2008 - including a visit by author Eleanor Lambert Wilson (pictured at right)
Danville Trinity Reading Camp

Bright and early today commenced the Trinity Danville's campus for Reading Camp 2008. Reading Camp is a week-long day camp for third- and fourth-grade kids who are reluctant readers in school with six different camps in Central and Eastern Kentucky. The parish hall, fireside room, nursery, and other rooms throughout the building have been turned into Reading Camp stations for the duration of the week. Kids are grouped into threes and fours, each group has a color name, and they rotate from station to station every thirty minutes, so every half-hour there's heavy traffic!

We'll start at the most important part of the day – breakfast. Officially Reading Camp doesn't begin until 8:00 a.m., but there were several bleary-eyed early arrivals quickly followed by the rest of the kids, when breakfast began with Keith Dunn tuning up his acoustic guitar to accompany the crunching of Frosted Flakes and Cheerios with lively music to wake everyone up. Amid confused and later figured-out lyrics to "She'll Be Comin' 'round the Mountain," "There's a Hole in the Bottom of the Sea," and "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" everyone did wake up, some of the teachers came in from last-minute training, groups were re-arranged as needed, and we were ready to start the day. Victoria Slocum explained the schedule of the week to come, that beading was an alternative to outside activities due to disagreeable weather, and was far enough ahead of schedule for an impromptu reading from The World According to Humphrey by Betty G. Birney, a book from the point of view of a classroom hamster. Everyone was very quiet while she read out loud, and then the Learning Centers began!

In my rotation around the different stations, I learned piece by piece what people in each station were doing, except Pleasure Reading which will remain a mystery today due to its closed doors: no distractions in Pleasure Reading! In Reading Comprehension, womaned by Lois H., everyone read a paragraph of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone aloud and took it apart with questions like "Who is Harry Potter?" and "What do you think this character looks like?" Near the end they did a magic trick with dollar bills and paperclips, and the group I saw followed all the directions to make it work.

The Writing station, headed by Ginny Birney, confused me on my first round through when they started talking about someone eating books and everyone got a pair of safety scissors, but as I learned later, today was more of a crafty day – they were making covers and the pages for the journals they'll be writing in throughout the week! I saw a lot of great covers, and all the kids were really excited to have their books made.

The third station is Phonics and Decoding, a package deal that comes with a package deal – Neil and Ginny E. Neil used flashcards and something I thought very clever – a rubber ball with high-frequency words all over it that he threw for each kid to catch, read a word, and throw back.

Our last station, Reading Strategies, headed by Tammy Jones and assisted by Ashley, is the station I became most acquainted with today – Tammy has to leave after the first Learning Centers session, so with Ashley's assistance and my observations I manned the last three groups after the snack break. Tammy has the kids take off their shoes and sit on a pillow, where she tells them they'll be reading the same book silently for ten minutes anywhere they like in the room. After the silent reading everyone reconvenes on the cushions and reads one page per person out loud, and the book is discussed. She asks the kids what kind of books they like to read, what kind of activities they enjoy doing, how often they go to the library when they're in school; questions to figure out the individual child's strengths. Tammy believes the best Reading Strategy is to read, read, read, and learn to love it.

After the last Learning Center sessions are over, it's time to go swimming – and from the beaming faces and wet hair, it's easy to see the kids had a great time. Everyone had a snack and went to the fireside room to hear a reading from the author of A Year at the Folk School, Eleanor Lambert Wilson. Ellie read about attending the country fair, seeing the judged livestock, and playing games and riding the Ferris Wheel at the Midway. After her reading she had a question-and-answer session, and described the folk school: a school that taught its students to care for animals, make crafts, and all kinds of useful things. Everyone applauded and thanked her for coming to see us, and then it was time for the last activity of the day – walking to the Community Arts Center. Since I stayed here to labor at the blog, we'll be in the dark about the Arts Center until tomorrow!

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

Danville Reading Camp is a go...

At 8:30 this morning, the parish of Trinity, Danville began hosting the first Reading Camp of the summer! Although recruiting wrapped up long ago with 24 3rd and 4th grade campers - who had been recommended by their schools and teachers to come to Reading Camp - a mother called Sunday to register her daughter. She had lost the paperwork and her daughter had so very much enjoyed camp last year that she wanted to make sure she had the opportunity to come again this year. So 25 campers are registered for the first of 7 Reading Camps this summer.

Please continue to keep the Danville Reading Camp in your prayers for this week.