World Camp 2016: recap

import from Watch Me Practice

My MIL got in on the fun at Hmong Market!

Camp began on Monday June 27th 2016 at 10:00 am in the sun porch. The students hunkered onto couches arranged around the edge of the room. The shades were pulled against morning sun. I sat cross-legged on the carpet in the center. We were safely ensconced. Unorthodox as a classroom, yet as cozy as a womb,  a suitable metaphor for the idea were were trying to fertilize here. A suitable atmosphere for the purpose of forming a cohesive group. Six of my students were soon to be freshman girls, one of which was my daughter, and the other two students were to be seniors, both of which were dear family friends--one a non-binary transgender fiction writer, the other a male Minnesotan ex-pat, come Oregonian poet. Some of these youth I had known a long long time. Some were new friends. We were all in this together.

This was World Camp version 2.0. In the first edition, students created joint imaginary worlds and then we forayed out into Minneapolis to feed our imaginations. Camp had always been fabulous, but 2016 was updated to honor interests of 2015 campers, plus my own evolving focus. I had reimagined camp with a focus on tourism. But unlike expected far flung destinations, ours would introduce us to unfamiliar parts of our city.