Published: July 22, 2008 10:01 pm            

Camp Invention provides elementary-aged kids with a ‘hands-on, minds-on’ experience

TERRE HAUTE — Tim Moss recently read a book titled “Are Kids Thinking or Shrinking?” which implied children didn’t fully use their intelligence when constantly playing video games.

Moss, director of Camp Invention at Indiana State University, arms campers with information no Xbox can teach.

“[The skills] go right along with life,” Moss said. “We try things, they don’t work and we try it differently. Doing it the right way’s great, but taking your mistakes and gaining from those is also important.”

Moss believes the camp provides elementary-aged children with a “hands-on, minds-on” experience.

The Discover Program part of the camp, which started Monday, teaches activities using comic books and Viking treasure adventures to keep the students engaged while learning problem-solving skills. The Imagine Program will run from Monday to Aug. 1. An environmental portion of the program explores a conceptual replica of Mars; and the participants fight pollution in the “Saving Sludge City” exercise. They also go to ISU’s recycling center to see the renewing process.

Both weeks present “I Can Invent” and “Remix Recess,” in which kids build a contraption of their own, and take a conventional game to remix — adding a twist to classic games like baseball.

Children entering grades first through sixth make up the campers and local certified counselors and teachers make up the staff. The camps cost $205 and meets daily from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at ISU’s College of Education on 501 N. Eighth St.

This year, directors of the camp elected to try two separate programs within the camp; the same week of events was used twice in the first five years of the program’s existence in Terre Haute. Camp Invention originated in 1990 at two sites in Akron, Ohio. Forty-seven states now host the camp that provides enrichment opportunities for children during the summer.

Moss showcased his inner child at camp on Tuesday, as he donned a name tag sporting his moniker for the day – Thomas Edison. Moss said the innovative lessons used to teach the kids will provide knowledge that will outlast their week in camp.

“It’ll help them to be earth friendly and think about how you can reuse things,” Moss said. “It also allows for kids to be creative and inventive, because so many kids today are couch potatoes.”

Although they may not understand the importance of the activities they performed, the kids have taken to the exercises. Four-year counselor Nathan Wells said their enthusiasm has made for a great experience.

“They’re as hyper as anything you’ve ever seen in your life” Wells said. “But that translates into a lot of enthusiasm for the camp and the classes.”

Regardless of how loud or energetic they get in camp, students take the knowledge with them, Wells said.

“It translates over into the real classroom a lot,” he said. “They have to synthesize, they have to innovate and create new things, all off the top of their heads. To be able to make a solution to a problem out of common objects – clay, Styrofoam, toothpicks – it’s really an amazing talent.”

To learn more about Camp Invention or to get children involved, visit www.campinvention.org or call 1-800-968-4332. Call Moss at (812) 201-7993.

DeAntae Prince can be reached at (812)231-4241 or deantae.prince@tribstar.com.

        

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