Bio-EXPLORERS summer camps a huge success in 2018!
Attendees of the second Bio-EXPLORERS summer camp, from 9th-13th July
On Friday 20th July, our Bio-EXPLORERS Science Summer Camp session drew to a close for 2018, following three weeks of exploration, discovery and fun.
The camps, a collaboration between Cell EXPLORERS, Eco-EXPLORERS (Discipline of Zoology) and Kitchen Chemistry (School of Chemistry) were hugely popular again this year, our fifth year running! We entertained a total of 69 children across the three weeks of glorious sunshine in NUI Galway.
Activities included:
- Learning about the digestive system and making fake poo
- Investigating your own cells under the microscope
- Extracting DNA from bananas
- Building a model of lungs and learning about respiration
- Art and Craft relating to science topics
- Playing board games and outdoor games
- Discovering protons, neutrons and electrons, and constructing models of atoms
- Learning about stick insects, spiders and reptiles, and even handling live snakes!
Our teams of camp instructors and demonstrators are College of science staff, graduates and students of NUI Galway who are enthusiastic to share their passion for exploring and discovering the wonders of our world. Camp participants work in small groups with their demonstrators to allow plenty of opportunity to interact and ask lots of questions. We hope to awaken their sense of curiosity and inspire them to develop their inquisitive mind.
The Cell EXPLORERS team was led by Nancy, who has been with us since our creation and has developed many aspects of our sessions and led many of our activities including our camps in the past. Nancy's team included experienced demonstrators Chloe, Eoin, Ben, as well as Alison. Thank you so much for your work and your smiles!
Our Cell EXPLORERS summer camp team: Ben, Nancy, Chloe and Eoin.
We received fantastic feedback from children and parents alike, with children collectively describing the Bio-EXPLORERS Camp as fun, exciting and informative:
“I liked everything the best and it was so enjoyable because it was fun”
“I liked looking at my cheek cells, but my favourite thing was the bug senses test”
“I really, really, really, really, really, enjoyed the camp and I will come back very, very, very, very soon!”
Vivienne O'Kelly of Kitchen Chemistry explaining the properties of liquid nitrogen
Parents strongly agreed that the camp was well-organised and that they would recommend this camp to other parents. They said the balance between learning and having fun was right and remarked that it was great value for money:
“(My child) was really happy and she talked all day about camp”
“I am very impressed with how this camp has been run – my child really enjoyed it and liked the ‘helpers’… You have a great balance between learning and fun.”
And so, another summer of Cell EXPLORERS activities draws to a close, with a hugely successful set of happy campers and (hopefully) tomorrow’s budding scientists.
