Sunshine Village Camp Week 2

Day 6: One in a Minion

I’m told that that munchkins got to go swimming this weekend, and it must have really tuckered them out because they were still sleeping when I got there on Monday.  We had to take it down a notch and ease into the week with some pipecleaner bracelets.

Once someone spilled all 5,000 beads (knew it would happen), the energy level really cranked up and things got real creative, real fast.  They love those pipecleaners and they were not going to be limited by the confines of my unimaginative example bracelet.

After I got them all jacked up, it was time to throw things…..not at each other for once.  Teacha got on Pintrest and found “Minion Bowling” with hand painted minion 2 liters bottles as the pins.  Really cute but labor intensive even before you become a human pin setter for 2 hours.  When there are 100 kids in the house, ya gotta cut some corners.  So I compromised with this duct tape version, which took me 20 minutes, and we went at it carnival toss style.

So the munchkins were minions today and really really good little minions at that.  If that’s what swimming does for their behavior, I’ll start digging a pool at school with my bare hands.

Day 7: Two in a Minion?

Let’s face it, minions are way too good to only be making a guest appearance at this camp, so we kept the theme running today with minion finger puppets.

We don’t have quite all the action captured because, once again, they erased my whole memory card so that Gift could make a 22 minute video of my butt. The director says, “I think they just fascinated everything about you, Yes I think so.”

I was concerned they wouldn’t be into conversation time once the puppets were finished but they made me SUUUUCH a proud teacher bear today. Their minions were chatty! I was so happy with them I could have cried.

Big performances like that deserve a big reward, so we took a snack (and photo) break then got back to it with more minion games.

I wouldn’t say that today was quite the kids favorite day but it was definitely mine. I’m so proud of those little munchkins. The minions are definitely invited to join us at school come test time.

Day 8: Alphabet Soup

Had another stellar performance from the munchkins today. They say victory is sweetest for those who have known defeat. Well these munchkins have kicked my “teacha big butt” all semester but after this week I really feel like I’m going out on a high note. I’m scared to think what I’ll have to do to atone for my 3 week absence when I get back…..probably move in, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

I gave them bowls of glittery letters and shapes (amazing purchase whoever sent these) and had them make flashcards on Popsicle sticks.

Once those letters came out they were about as inquisitive as the Cambodian border patrol and I know from personal experience. “Teacha how spell?” “Teacha what this?” “Teacha why not have a love?” (That questions goes with every subject).

I’ve spent months trying to teach them to spell their names and they couldn’t care less but today they even went to their rooms and got out dictionaries, suddenly knew what vowels were…it was miraculous.

I thought they would make one or two and get bored but luckily I brought a backup pack of Popsicle sticks because those munchkins went to town!

We had a newbie join us today, Kwang. She isn’t actually new, but she has been in a real funk all of break and hasn’t wanted to play with us at all. This is what breaks my heart about the munchkins, because Kwang isn’t normally like this and there is no one to ask her what is wrong.

Day 9: Bubble Ball

You can’t have a successful camp without factoring bubbles into the equation and if you combine that with minions and things you’re not allowed to play with (like food coloring), you’re winning.

Normally its a competition to see who can make the longest bubble snake but minions are all about teamwork and so are WE! So, we combined forces to make huge bubble balls and played catch with them until someone (and by someone I mean me) could no longer resist the temptation and popped the bubble into a million little bubble pieces.

This was messy and unsanitary so in other words, FANTASTIC.

After our last bubble burst, we moved onto popping something else. That’s right, balloons are back. This time everyone got 3 (yes 3!!!) and they got to choose their own color if they could say it in English. Every single munchkin said their colors in English which is a HUUUUUUGE milestone for us.

And look who else showed up once the balloons came out:

One more surprise….teacha may have put tattoos inside the balloons:-)

Only one day left of clowning around with these kiddos but I’m confident that I saved the best for last.

Day 10: F is for Famous

A picture is worth a thousand words. Well the munchkins and I have literally 1,000 pictures of our last day together and only one word for the lot of them: famous.

They always put on a show but this one was extra special and “supa famous”.

As luck would have it, their social worker was there today for my famous send off and spoke English so she was able to explain to them that I will be gone for 3 weeks but I am coming back.

I miss those munchkins already.

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