Summer camp. A right of passage each summer for so many children was drastically different this year. Almost every camp provider held a virtual experience but The Dakota Center from the get go was focused on delivering an in-person experience. You have heard, I’m sure, that play is defined as a child’s work. It is through play that children learn to arrange and make sense of the world. Play also helps children work through anxiety in their lives and during a 100 year pandemic play is something drastically needed. Play brings out children’s creativity and so much more.
Remember when we were children? You probably did the same things I did like riding bikes, climbing trees, playing hide-and-seek, kick-the-can and quieter things like drawing, playing board games or cards. You learned much from these experiences like building your strength, learning how to play well with others, and share not only in the experience but your toys with others as well.
The National Association for the Education of Young Children said this, “A growing body of behavioral research establishes relationships between children’s play and development in several areas, including language (Toub et al. 2016), executive functions (Tominey & McClelland 2011), mathematics and spatial skills (Fisher et al. 2013), scientific thinking (Schulz & Bonawitz 2007), and social and emotional development (Dore, Smith, & Lillard 2015). One reason that play might be such a valuable pedagogical tool is that it features the precise contexts that facilitate learning. An amalgamated research field called the science of learning has identified four key ingredients of successful learning: learning occurs best when children are mentally active (not passive), engaged (not distracted), socially interactive (with peers or adults), and building meaningful connections to their lives (Hirsh-Pasek et al. 2015).
If these 4 ingredients are accurate, which I believe they are, then virtually learning falls short. We wanted to make sure this year, in particular, the children who attended our camp will look back and remember playing with other children. When they are asked as adults what they did during the summer of the 2020 pandemic, they will say, I went to summer camp with other kids at The Dakota Center and had a wonderful time.
