The Camden County Environmental Center in Cherry Hill is continuing through Friday, Jan. 9 its Winter Environmental Day Camp for kids of various ages.
The programs range from one to one-and-a-half-hour sessions that began during winter break last month.
Participants were separated into two groups, SnowTop Tots for children from 5 years old and younger on Mondays and Winter Tracks for those age 6 to 12 on Tuesdays and Fridays. Each class has a maximum class size of 15 students.
Each age group was taught about various aspects of the environment and natural world, specifically topics related to winter, and both groups covered seasonal hibernation. The younger group dabbled in winter nature discovery and snowflakes, while the older kids covered winter survival, the science behind snow and winter birds.
Fern Nguyen is one of the center’s environmental educators. She runs the winter program, as well as other environmental day camps in spring and summer. The winter break program is the first of its kind.
“We’ve been trying to put more effort into engaging the community on environmental topics,” she explained. “So we thought it’d be great to have a winter break program, especially for the younger ages, to engage them early on.”
The students also got to do STEM activities, as well as outdoor projects.
“The kids are off break, so it’s perfect to come in and do some fun activities like hiking, creating snow or looking up at snowflakes or exploring winter animals and hibernation,” Nguyen noted.
She said the county’s board of commissioners came up with the idea to get youngsters in the area engaged with the natural world and the environmental mission of the county.
“We really try to emphasize hands-on engagement, fun things for the kids to do,” she said. “The kids seem to be very engaged or very happy to participate in our activities, so we’re trying to get them outside playing in what little snow we have and exploring.”
Participants also utilized outdoor natural resources to make items like pine needle soda or pine cone syrup, and they analyzed the beaks of birds to see how they might seek out food through the season.
“We were having a good response to our winter program …,” Nguyen said. “It’s something for kids to report to while looking for something to do during their time off from school.”
