Homeschooling Help!
For many of us, one of the biggest challenges in having our kids home full-time during this pandemic is finding ourselves in the role of homeschooling parent. Audrey “Sunshine” Monke, GAC’s Chief Visionary Officer, has compiled some resources to help. To view the videos and access the resources, click on the links below.
Would you like some resources?
Creative ideas for parents of younger kids (preschool-early elementary) from GAC Camp Director Alison Moeschberger
Homeschool strategies from an experienced homeschool parent (all ages, but many resources for kids through middle school)
On her website (Sunshine Parenting) and her podcast, Sunshine is sharing many resources to encourage and support parents during this pandemic. To access those resources, sign up to receive her weekly emails or subscribe to her podcast.
Help Us Name Our New Lip Balms!
At Gold Arrow Camp, we are passionate about lip protection! We’re so passionate that every year we have fun-named lip balms for our camp store. Past winners have included hits like Zip Lime, Tropical Trout, and Knee Ski Grape. This year is no different! Once again, we invite you to think up the best camp-inspired name for the following lip balm featured flavors and send them to us. How? You could email us, or you could post it to either Instagram or Facebook and tag us (@goldarrowcamp). We will also be taking suggestions on our Instagram story on Monday, March 9! We can’t wait to see what your creativity comes up with this year!
This year’s featured flavors are:
- Kiwi
- Pineapple
- Blueberry
- Spearmint
Friendship Skills at GAC
Hello GAC families! We have created a friendship skills survey for you to complete. This information will help us tailor our friendship activities at camp this summer so that it will be most helpful to our camp families. Thank you for taking a couple of minutes to fill this out. We look forward to your feedback! Please click here to complete the survey!
Unplug with GAC!
Again this year, Gold Arrow Camp will be participating in the National Day of Unplugging. This day is a movement to encourage people to get a “24-hour respite from technology.”
The National Day of Unplugging encourages people to use 24 hours free from technology to connect with “ourselves, our loved ones, and our communities.” Wow. That sounds an awful lot like camp. We love the idea of unplugging (just for a little bit) at home so that we can reforge the kind of connections there that we forge at camp, where we’re totally free from the burden of technology.
You can join us in celebrating by pledging to #unplug on social media, sharing this news story, or even hosting an unplugged event! You could host an old-fashioned dinner party, spend Saturday the 7th working on puzzles or playing board games. You can even have a sleepover without phones!
If you have plans to unplug, please tag us in those on your social media. We’d love to share your plans (and what you did, after the fact, of course) on our social media!
National No One Eats Alone Day
“No One Eats Alone is a Positive Prevention Initiative that works to prevent bullying before it starts by teaching students to lead the movement to change the culture of middle school!”
National No One Eats Alone Day is February 14, 2020! This popular national program is celebrated in many schools across the country and is a student-led event. It is a day where all kids feel included and accepted by their peers. Would you like to have your school participate? We encourage you to partner with a teacher and click here to sign up where you can request a No One Eats Alone Day backpack. The backpack will help you launch your own NOEAD at your school! If you’re not sure if your school is already registered, see here!
GACentines are Back!
You know the struggle. You want to give out Valentine’s cards to your classmates, but you want something unique. Something that really shows them how special they are to you. Once again, we here at Gold Arrow Camp are here to help! That’s right, we’re back with our version of the classic Valentine’s card, the GACentine.
Let the people in your life know how you feel about them by printing these special notes of affection, featuring some of your favorite counselors and activities.
Nothing says love quite like Rico California!
Let Slim and Delta express your love.
Let Free’s passion for freedom express your feelings for that special someone.
We love how expressive our horses are!
We can’t resist a PoCo inspired GACentine!
For those people you just love spending time with, we suggest this.
We have two backpacking themed options:
Nothing like a good Buzz pun to say “Happy Valentine’s!”
Finally, Canoechery.
Clothing Labels
One FAQ that parents (especially first year families!) ask as they prepare for camp is, “How do I label everything for camp?” This is a great question and an important one. At GAC, we ask that all items (clothing, water bottles, toothpaste, etc.) are labeled prior to your camper’s arrival. If a camper misplaces something or an item is mixed up in the laundry, if it’s labeled, it will most likely end up back with the camper.
Label types have varied over the years: iron-on, marked by hand, and stick-on. All of the GAC directors have children who attend camp and have firsthand knowledge of the different label types and techniques and can commiserate with the frustration of discovering 10 labels (2o+ if they have siblings!) stuck to the inside of the washing machine! Based on experience, we are recommending the following label options in order of preference:
- Use a permanent marker (aka “Sharpie”) to write the camper’s first initial and last name. This is an easy and cost effective method. Be sure to be consistent with the labeling and avoid the use of initials only. Tip: use a silver marker for dark clothing!
- Iron-on labels work well. It’s a time consuming task but those pre-made labels tend to stay on longer than stick-on labels and won’t damage items that don’t have clothing tags.
- Stick-on labels are great for non-clothing items such as toiletries, shoes, and flashlights. Even the youngest campers can help with this labeling task!
Which ever method you choose, just remember to label everything, even socks and undies!
Join Sunshine’s Happy Campers Book Club
Happy Campers is a joyful and wise parenting book. Drawing on her lifetime of experience as a camper, camp counselor and camp director, Audrey Monke shows us what is most important in the lives of children. She then takes the next step and teaches parents how they can recreate the magic of camp in their own homes. I have never read a more optimistic and well-grounded guide to parenting.
–Michael G. Thompson, Ph.D., Bestselling author of Raising Cain
Keep the growth and happiness of summer camp going all year! Join author Audrey “Sunshine” Monke in the Happy Campers Book Club as she shares resources and ideas from her book, Happy Campers, 9 Summer Camp Secrets for Raising Kids Who Become Thriving Adults!
To join the Happy Campers Book Club
Step 1: Pick up a copy of Happy Campers at your favorite book seller: Barnes & Noble, Indiebound, Books-A-Million, or KOBO
Step 2: Complete this form, and you’ll be sent exclusive downloadable resources and monthly links to join (optional) Zoom coaching calls with Sunshine.
Free Happy Campers Downloads
2020 Read-Along Schedule
Workbook & Discussion Guide
Happy Campers Book Trailer (featuring GAC campers & staff)
2020 Dance Themes!
One of the highlights of each session is our camp-wide dance. We all come together at our Granite Grove event space for a night of kicking our heels up to some of our favorite songs.
Dances feature favorite group dances, like Footloose and Tragedy. There’s also our photo booth for some pictures with friends, special snacks and drinks like the “Soy Rogers” and “Shirley Chipmunk,” and a wide selection of games for those campers that prefer playing over dancing.
Each of our dances has a theme, and campers and staff are encouraged to dress up to match the theme. Some people bring costumes from home, while others improvise using their clothes or making something at Arts & Crafts. Whatever you choose to do, we know you’ll have a great time at our dances.
This year’s dance themes are:
June Shaver Specialty: Hollywood
Come as your favorite celebrity or dress to impress as one of your favorite movie characters for this fun SoCal themed party!
Session 1: Pirates
Shiver me timbers matey! Session 1 campers will be walking the plank to fun with their peg-legs, eye patches, and other pirate accessories.
Session 2: Groovy Hippies and Tie-Dye
Let’s have some far-out fun in Session 2, when we enjoy the dance with our best hippie costumes, or your tie-dyed favorites.
Session 3: Halloween
Having a hard time coming up with a costume for Session 3’s Halloween dance? Any costume will do as we celebrate the one night of the year when people love costumes as much as we do on dance night.
Session 4: Winter Wonderland
It’ll be the end of August, but we’re going to dress like a blizzard is on the way for our Winter Wonderland dance for Session 4.
Mini Camp and August Specialty: Candy Land
It’s a night for sweet treats as we end the summer with a dance celebrating candy, or the board game Candy Land!
Sunshine Visits Chandler School This Thursday
This Thursday, November 14, 2019, Sunshine will be spending time with parents and friends of Chandler School in Pasadena, CA. Her talk on “Raising Kids Who Become Thriving Adults” is part of their ParentEd series, which also features two of Sunshine’s favorite parenting educators – Tina Payne Bryson, Ph.D. & Julie Lythcott-Haims.
If you are in the Pasadena area and want more information, please click here. We hope to see you there!