Camp gives sensory experience to special needs kids
The United Cerebral Palsy of Huntsville is giving children with cerebral palsy a camp that is out of this world this summer.
Sensory Camp, in its third year, is open to children ages 5-12 in Madison, Morgan, Marshall, Limestone, Jackson and surrounding counties. This year's camps were held June 4-8 and June 25-29.
Space is the theme for this year's camps. Campers wear moon boots during their gross motor session. According to Vader, these boots made of sponges and rubber bands are campers' favorites. For lunch on Monday, campers indulged in astronaut pudding, a snack that they mixed themselves in plastic bags which also helps fine motor muscles.
"NASA donated items for goodie bags and a staff member dressed up as an astronaut to enforce our space theme," Vader said.
The camp is divided into three sessions: art, computer technology and gross motor development. Art projects include decorating camp T-shirts, painting on large paper and shining flashlights in the dark. The computer technology session uses UCP's Technology Assistance for Special Consumers, a program that provides assistive technology services for individuals, professionals and caregivers. Through the Microsoft Accessibility Resource Center, campers create an online journal using Intellikeys. These keys allow campers to press a photo key to record their feelings. The snack keys were the most popular amongst campers.
"The children get to choose a daily snack on their journal keys. They choose snow cones everyday. We all thought that was funny," Vader said.
UCP Huntsville's Microsoft Accessibility Resource Center is the first and only one in the state of Alabama.
The camp and its scholarships are funded by the Jurenko Foundation, founded by former ADTRAN marketing executive John Jurenko and his wife, Ruth.
"Some of our campers are clients of ours and others are community children that get camp scholarships through the Jurenko foundation," Vader said.
Volunteers of all kinds make the camp function on a daily basis. The Tennessee Valley Vipers sent football players to read to campers, the Colors Fine Arts Center contributed musical entertainment and Petsmart provided dogs, birds, guinea pigs and a snake.
"The Petsmart people taught the children how to handle animals. The campers loved the snake the most," Vader said.
The Volunteer Center of Madison County arranged for student volunteers to help teach campers. One of the teen volunteers is Sarah Nokes of North Carolina. Nokes, a senior at Notre Dame, is interning at the Volunteer Center for the summer.
"This is the first time I have worked with kids with disabilities and I have learned to see them as just kids. Yes, it is easier to have compassion for them because of their disability, but they are just great, loving kids that are fun to play with. It has been a great experience," Nokes said.
Marina Milito wrote on Jul 5, 2007 2:52 PM: