The Oak Learner’s summer didn’t stop at the Eco Adventures Camp! We also had our Arts and Adventures Camp running for 8 weeks in Summer 2022. The Arts and Adventures Camp focuses on an indoor and outdoor summer. Following themed weeks, the campers are able to spend time in the local community and try new activities. The goal is a structured and enjoyable week, for every week of camp!
Oak Learners is a place with a strong focus on community. Being located in the small community of Mimico, Oak takes advantage of the surrounding facilities, including parks, pools, splash pads, and locally owned stores and companies. The camp counselors perfect a balance between outdoor and indoor learning, in an attempt to keep the children mentally and physically stimulated at all times. We also encourage adventures and breaking your own boundaries for the children, so that they can grow and thrive in a safe environment.
Week 1 Celebrate Canada
Week 1 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was a Celebrate Canada theme. The counsellors took inspiration from the Canadian flag, and encouraged a more abstract, creative spin on it for one of the activities. The campers were able to paint the flag in any way that they felt expressed their creativity the best. We also explored the local park and appreciated the beautiful summer weather that Toronto had to offer us; the perfect way to Celebrate Canada!
Week 2 Amazing Animals
Week 2 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was the theme Amazing Animals. This week had a creative approach to it! The kids were able to paint, color, draw, and cut out their own puppets. They chose their animals and designed them how they wanted. It just so happened, everyone had an underwater animal theme, and they were able to put on an ocean themed puppet show for all of our counsellors and staff to enjoy. It was a great moment emphasizing team work and community, and really impacted all of the staff at Oak Learners.
Week 3 Space Sciences
Week 3 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was the theme Space Sciences. This week was all about extraterrestrial life! The kids created goofy looking aliens and space ships out of Popsicle sticks and pipe cleaners. They were even lucky enough that one of our counsellors came up with a story to go with the creations the kids provided.
Week 4 Let the Games Begin
Week 4 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was Let the Games Begin, in honor of the Commonwealth Games. The kids had an education centered week, with lots of reading up on the different countries participating in the Commonwealth Games. The Mimico Library became a regular spot for them to enrich their brains, and appreciate the quiet of the summer.
Week 5 Nature and Experiments
Week 5 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was Nature and Experiments week. This week focused on learning how to treat our environment. The Lakeshore was full of sea glass which forms from the water naturally deteriorating glass leftover from bottles, and other human products. The camp safely collected the worn down glass, with soft edges, and created a tree out of the brown and green bits that they found. Cleaning the environment, while also getting creative!
Week 6 Love Our City
Week 6 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was Love Our City. For this week, the counsellors decided to give back to the community that had been housing all of their fun for the summer. In an attempt to show their love to the city, the campers gloved up, and collected the garbage in the local parks that they were visiting throughout the week. They collected almost 3 bags of garbage every day, and were taught the valuable lesson of the recycling system in the city of Toronto. They also made CN Tower cut out designs in the freshly cleaned park!
Week 7 Bugs and Butterflies
Week 7 of the Arts and Adventures Camp was Bugs and Butterflies. Nature did all the work for this week, as there were so many butterflies on the wild flowers. The group would enjoy the beauty of the creatures, and also go back to Oak and attempt to mimic the beautiful designs they saw on the wings. The art was extra colorful this week!
Week 8 We Are the Future
The final week of the Arts and Adventures Camp was We Are the Future! To encourage and strengthen confidence in the kids this week was about showing them what they’ve got! They were instructed to redesign Hillside Park in a way that they thought was a more productive use of the space. They came up with some amazing ideas that would really make a beautiful park for the community. Hopefully they hold on to those ideas and make that park a reality one day!
There is nothing as truly beautiful as a child’s mind. Oak Learners is about encouraging that beauty to flourish. Instilling confidence, creativity, community, and drive are some of the many goals of Oak Learners. We strive for our campers to know they are their own people, and are strong in their own choices and decisions. The Arts and Adventures Camp exposed the amazing depth of all of your children’s minds, and we really were changed by all the ideas, inquiries and conversations that the campers brought this year. Thank you all for your participation in Summer Camp 2022, and we hope to see you for more fun next year!
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