Floyd County Schools and Berry to offer gifted summer program

Media release: Summer break from school is near and many parents will be looking for opportunities for enrichment camps for their children.  Floyd County Schools and Berry College have teamed-up to provide a gifted summer camp for children in the Northwest Georgia area.  Viking Explorations will be held on the campus of Berry College and is a summer program for gifted and talented students in grades three through five.  The program will be held July 15-19, 2013 from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. 

Viking Explorations will be taught by full-time college faculty, teachers from Berry College Elementary and Middle School, and gifted program teachers from Floyd County Schools.  Children will have the opportunity to select two classes from the variety of options offered by the program.  The first class will be from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.  The second class will begin at 10:30 a.m. and end at 12:30 p.m.  "As we looked at what was offered for our gifted children over the summer, we saw a void of programs here in our area," stated McCall Govignon, director of advanced academic programs for Floyd County Schools. "I approached Berry College about hosting a program and their excitement about the opportunity quickly developed into Viking Explorations."  Govingnon added, "We are thrilled about the summer academic exploration this program will offer for our gifted program students in Floyd County Schools." 

Tuition for Viking Explorations is $125.00.  Supplies and equipment needed during the camp are included in the price along with snacks.  Parents may register their children online at: http://www.berry.edu/vikingexplorations.  Children must be in the gifted academic program in their local school to register for the program.

Classes offered during this summer's Viking Explorations include:

BOLD Outdoor Leadership:  The Berry College Outdoor Leadership course will require the imagination and cooperation of every participant as we build communication skills and team confidence on low ropes course elements.   

Chess Masters:  Taking players from piece pushers to strategic thinkers in one of the world's oldest games is the goal. Players will learn opening strategy, defense tactics, common checkmates and how to anticipate when their opponent will play next. 

Creative Writing:  Children will explore creative writing techniques, including narrative, memoir and poetry.   By analyzing examples from famous authors, they will create different strategies for engaging hooks and creating different moods in writings.

Hiking through History:  Children will be guided through rich experiences in history by looking through a lens to the past, exploring documents firsthand in the Berry College Library Archives, the Martha Berry Digital Archives and various historical sites on the Berry campus.  

Summer at the Improv!:  Children will learn the basic rules of improv, including state presence..  Most importantly, students will gain self-confidence, learn to celebrate the quirks that make us all unique and fabulous, build team-work skills, practice critical thinking and have a blast playing a wide variety of improv games.

Think, Create, Invent:  This hands-on course will help children become future inventors with a goal of creating and designing new and better ways of doing things.  We will learn about famous inventors of the past and present, mistakes that worked and wacky inventions.

Math Building!: Children will focus on using mathematics to build objects. Through hands-on math activities exciting topics will be explored such as puzzles, fractals and bridges. These engaging challenges will encourage the use of geometry, measurement and number pattern knowledge.

Odyssey of the Mind: Students develop their creative, original and diverse thinking.  Students will be placed on teams that will foster teamwork, cooperation and appreciation of others while developing self-respect and respect for others through brainstorming and role playing. 

Introduction into VEX Robotics:  Children will use the VEX Robotics design system to build a robot to compete in fun, real world challenges like robo-soccer, obstacle courses, sack attack, tag, maze solving and much more.  The Vex Robotics design system is the same system used in major regional and national robotics competitions as well as in many middle school, high school and university level robotics classes.

Story Telling and Retelling:  Children will learn about the history, principles and techniques for collecting, organizing and sharing stories.  They will listen to stories from master storytellers and then prepare our own story to tell to the group on the final day of class.

"Un Poco de Todo en Espanol" "A Bit of Everything in Spanish": The Spanish language will be used to introduce children to the days of the week, the months of the year, numbers, colors, weather, body parts, articles of clothing, foods, animals, family vocabulary, modes of transportation, special places, geography, common phrases and cultural aspects.  Activities will include songs, games, skits and a lot of fun. 

For more information about Viking Explorations, contact McCall Govignon at 706-234-1031 or email at mgovignon@floydboe.net.  More information is also available on the Berry College website at http://www.berry.edu/vikingexplorations.