Well today has been a very interesting day, we started off our morning practicing our final performance. Tere has worked hard with all of the children to teach them all African music, and between all of the monitors we have been able to put together this African themed show. The crafts have made the shakers, some bracelets and also some crowns.
In our English lessons we have been learning the corresponding vocabulary also African based (musical instruments, tribes and African animals). After breakfast we prepared for our show by dressing up and putting stickers on our faces to look the part, we all participated in the wonderful performance which was great, each group had their own part to carry out and together this is what we have achieved.
I’m very proud of all the effort the children have made to make this posible. Thank you all and I hope you have all enjoyed your summer with us! It has been a pleasure! Written by Stephie
Today has been a fun packed day, first we practiced the African Musical for our final performance on Monday. The children have been working hard and the effort they have put in has payed off nicely.
As many children are not coming on Monday we decided to have our «last day» party today. So after breakfast we had our last foam party. The groups took it in turns, first the younger two groups then the other two groups. Some children weren’t very sure about the foam at first whilst others just dived straight in. We lay on the floor making foam angels 👼 and of course we joined in also!!
We have had some much fun together adults and children!!
This thursday we had an amazing Zumba class! It was super duper fun! Zumba is a dance fitness program, it was invented in the 90s in Colombia. It’s a worldwide phenomenon, it has approximately 15 million dancers in gyms who have weekly official Zumba classes. It’s so popular because it combines complete aerobic exercises with energetic latin music and dance moves! It’s an awesome way to stay in shape.
Our choreographies were fantastic, each group had a personalized dance and class. We included songs like «El tiburón» by Henry Mendez or «Fireball» by Pitbull, to keep the class nice and motivating! The classes were full of dance moves but also a few squats, lunges and other simple full body exercises. Since we were group dancers for a day, we needed a group name so each group had their own! The youngest ones were «The Little Oranges», the next one was «The Superhero Gang», then there was the «The Rock n’Roll Group» and the older children where «The Fantastic Green Team». Cool names, right?
You can find many Zumba videos on websites like Youtube and dance at home with the kids! If you are interested in Zumba classes, the official website http://www.Zumba.com has a list which includes gyms that have licensed instructors and Zumba classes near you. There are different varieties, like Aqua Zumba (which is in a pool), Zumba Gold (for seniors), Zumba Kids/ Kids Jr. (for children of all ages) and many more! We enjoyed our class, so why not try it out?
It seems like it was yesterday when we started with the rhythms of «Mother Earth» and we are already practically closing our theme of África.
In these last sessions, we have gathered information and put image and name to everything we have learnt.
We have seen other cultures and other ways of life and tried to empathize with them by dancing barefoot, putting on looms, and looking for a leader for our tribe.
We have our great performance as the closing of the African trip this summer, which will surely work great.
We look forward to other workshops to see where the músic leads us in future occasions. Written by Tere
Today we spent our time competing! The main goal of the game is to capture our team’s flag, which is somewhere in the other team’s field and it’s guarded by three rival players. In order to achieve this, our campers had to use strategies to avoid being captured by the other team while trying to get the flag.
The rule is that when the players are in their own field, they are out of reach of the defenders. If the player is captured, he has to leave the game for a few minutes.
They enjoyed it and were very excited during the sport time, in spite of the heat we had today. No doubt they were happy as a clam!
Today we started the day with African animals, they learnt all about the animals habitats, what they eat, how they get their food and generally how they live. We had great fun stomping around like elephants, stretching tall like giraffes and roaring like a lion, we even crawled around squeaking like meerkats.
With the older children we played «charades» a game where the children were given a word they had to act out to their team, without talking, and their teammates had to guess what the words were. We had words like surfing to a dancing monkey. Everyone participated, we all had a good chuckle, it was very amusing. Some actions were hard to interpret yet very comical.
In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight 🎼However, today we have done everything except sleeping!We have been playing in a jungle!
In the park, we pretended that we were wild animals and we had to take care our territory. We should be careful about the hunters, the bigger animals than we, and any danger that might be out there… And we learnt to look after each other: tiger mothers protecting to babies and feeding them; the gigant giraffe collecting fruit from the trees for all animals; the little monkeys playing together in the wood house and trying to climb to the top of the trees; or the big elephants walking across the warm sand!
In our jungle we shared nice emotions in touch with the nature.
All of us have spent a great time feeling how animals live in freedom!
Today we’ve done an activity which is thousands of years old.
«…What could that be?» You might ask yourselves; well,we had yoga sessions! Did you know that yoga was invented in ancient India? It is a very old activity, it is 5.000 years old! By the way, do you know what «yoga» means in Sanskrit? It means «to listen», because the group of physical, mental and spiritual activities that we do, must listen to our bodies and its requirements.
The children have done a great variety of poses and positions like: The tree, the downward dog, the twisted triangle or the lion! The lion is a super fun pose because, as we maintain the pose, we have to roar like lions to expel all the negative emotions! We’ve gotten sweaty as we did all the sets, so after so much work, we had a very relaxing session. We learned how to breathe properly as we exercised and meditated; breathing correctly is the first and most important rule of yoga!
There was also some soothing music playing while we did yoga, it was quite helpful, it helped us concentrate. You can find lots of yoga related music on Youtube.
We also sang a few mantras together, like the famous «Oommm», it mades us feel more united and the vibrations were good for our muscles and bodies in general.
Once the session was completed, we finished and respectfully chanted «Namaste» to eachother.
We used todays sessions to played changing the roles in the musical activity, and see reflected what they have learnt so far.
The students have had the opportunity to develop their capacity for creation, and like any African tribe, assume their role of leader or «director», while the rest respond.
Just in the hottest moment of the morning, they took their corresponding dip in the centres pools, where they enjoyed their free play time.
The youngest ones started learning a new dance, the «kuku dance» that will be perfected throughout the sessions.
Today we had an exciting and fun day playing sports. In particular we were learning how to play basketball. The older children enjoyed playing a basketball match for half an hour, making sure they were following the official rules. Afterwards, they took a break in which they chose what they wanted to play. The middle-aged group experienced a mini-basketball match using the small ring and during the break, they bounced like crazy on the trampoline.
The little ones on campus ran an obstacle course in the play area and they played mini-games with a rubber ball. They made the most of it thanks to all their effort!
Engish Urban Summer Camp 