Summer camps for kids might be full of perils these days.
However, virtual online camps are as safe as it gets. That’s one reason the Greensboro-based Kellin Foundation is switching gears from previous summers, and, this year, is presenting free, “virtual” mini-camp sessions from Wednesday, July 22 to Friday, July 24 for children ages 5 through 12.
These sessions, which organizers are calling “fun and active” – despite being internet-bound – will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. daily. The sessions are meant to “nourish children, body and mind.”
The Kellin Foundation, a widely recognized National Child Traumatic Stress Network site in Guilford County, has the stated mission of building “resilient children, families, and adults through behavioral health services, victim advocacy, and community outreach.”
Even though the pandemic has put life on hold for many area groups, the foundation has in recent months been trying to achieve its goals of providing comfort for victims – young and old – through online offerings of various programs meant to help those who have experienced trauma. For instance, on Friday, July 10, the foundation used the ubiquitous Zoom-service to put on a one-hour discussion with Sabrina Huda, the project director for Sesame Workshops. That’s the nonprofit education-based organization that brought you Sesame Street. Sesame Workshops works to help the most vulnerable and underserved kids as well as their families.
The Kellin Foundation is also implementing, locally, the global program known as “The Caring for Each Other initiative,” – a response to the deadly pandemic that’s been rolled out in more than 93 countries in 36 languages. According to promotional materials describing that effort, the initiative offers resources “designed to help parents provide comfort and manage anxiety, as well as help with creating routines, fostering playful learning at home, and staying physically and mentally healthy.”
And, certainly, everyone can use a little anxiety relief these days.
A 2-hour session for three days on a computer is not summer camp. Summer camp has to be HOT, SWEATY, DIRTY, and include mosquito bites and scraped knees. Summer camp should be from 8 or 9 am to 5:30 pm M-F and include some type of water meaning you need a bathing suit and sunscreen, a bag lunch with a warm drink from home, strangers that you become best friends with by the last day, talent shows, learning about bugs and that animals die in the woods, and the scent of pine needles. Summer camp has quiet time for storytelling and wild time for running off energy, time for doing crafts to take home, and time for singing silly songs. You have to be outside, not inside, a good part of the time in order to be at CAMP. Geez, the things we are denying kids.