Urban Roots wants to get kids excited about science by teaching it through a hands-on Farm Camp. The organization has done Farm Camps for the last three years, but this is the first year they will offer it during the weeks of Washoe County School District’s spring break.
The camps last a week and are available for children ages 5 to 12. The first week from March 31 to April 4 is titled Birds, Bugs and Butterflies, and the second week—April 7 to 11—is Spring Showers and Flowers. The camp runs Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. for $150 per week. For busier parents or kids that want more time at Urban Roots, you can pay an additional $25 per week to extend those hours from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Most of the camp will be outside, but Urban Roots is renovating a recently vacated bar that serves as an indoor classroom if the weather doesn’t allow outdoor activities.
Activities vary throughout the week, but they typically do farm chores when they arrive in the morning, like care for the chickens and rabbit and seasonal planting or gardening. Later in the day, the children do more activities related to the theme of the week, like learning about the critters that live around the farm during the first week or flowers that are in bloom the second week.
“We’ll be doing some planting and mulching and those kind of things,” Daniel said. “We do a lot of pollination stuff in the spring and learn about how plants grow and what they’re going through in the spring, so a lot of science experiments and running around games to demonstrate that stuff.”
Daniel said that it’s important for kids to understand how their food gets to their tables and to show them some real-life applications of science in ways they can enjoy.
“The overall purpose of all of our Farm Camp programs is to help connect kids to where their food comes from in a fun way,” Daniel said. “We’re really this year trying to focus on science education and using STEM [science, technology, engineering and math] and the new Next Generation Science Standards to show kids how fun science can be.”
To further that connection between the campers and their food, part of each day will be spent making tasty snacks from the garden.
“Every afternoon we make the afternoon snack together, so they really can see how things from the garden go from the farm to the table and how you can make healthy treats out of things you can grow here in northern Nevada,” Daniel said.
The camps have risen in popularity since they began. Daniel said they have a pretty strong base group of kids that come out to most or all of their camps and events. Urban Roots is working to expand that group, though, and Daniel said the group of people interested is growing because she sees more people doing small scale farming and gardening at their own homes.
Farm Camp is offered during every summer as well. Registration is already open. There will be eight weeks of camps from June 16 to Aug. 8, and each is open for ages 5 to 12 this year.