I am sure I was the last person in all of America to see this video. But this week someone showed me the video of a 10 year old girl that in my opinion could dethrone Susan Bolye as the most amazing vocal talent I have ever seen. I remember hearing Susan for the first time she was stunning. Equally stunning is Jackie Evancho a 10 year old girl who has only been singing for 2 years. Unbelievable! Enjoy.

Every year I try a few different things at camp. Some of them become a part of camp others we NEVER do again. Here are a list of things that we tried this year at camp.

1. I used social media alot – The past two years I have had a hard time getting Mom’s and Dad’s to go to camp as councilors we also had a down year this year attendance wise so one of the tools I wanted to use to fix that was using social media to help peel away the mystery of camp. So parents who had kids at camp could see what was going on and parents who’s kids had yet to attend could build excitement and anticipation.

What social media did I use?

Facebook – Most parents I know have a facebook and know how to use facebook so this is by far the most helpful in getting the info out there. From face book I linked to my blog, because well I don’t like facebook and I can control the layout of my posts on my blog much easier than FB. On facebook I published updates from my twitter account and posted pictures for parents. I uploaded all my photos to facebook using pixelpipe for my iphone.

My Blog – This year I summed up each day with a blog post and video that supported and summed up what we did. I shot and edited all that footage on my iphone with iMovie for the iPhone. The reason for using my blog was two fold. 1. I could control the layout (have I told you I hate facebook) 2. So parents who didn’t know I have a blog could find it because I often write about stuff I am thinking for Uptown as well as things that could help other parents from what I am learning as a parent.

Youtube - I uploaded videos I shot and edited from my phone up to Youtube directly. Very stinking cool

Twitter -  to point parents to my blog and facebook.

Ustream - We used Ustream to put our evening services online for parents to view. I love the idea of parents spying on kids without kids knowing that their parents are spying. We had a couple of hiccups and will plan to do streaming better next year.

2. Journals – I made some journals for the kids – nothing elaborate but just got some notebooks from the dollar store and added bling to them that pertained to the theme of camp. Each morning I shared a few minutes and then the kids met with their councilors and talked through the assignment I gave them and wrote in their journal. This worked great we will do it next year for sure.

3. Partner with parents – This year I tried to include parents in on the process of camp through social media, and on the last day I made a video for parents summing up what we talked to their kids about each day and gave them some ideas for next steps after camp.

4. Movie night - For a night time activity we did a movie night I really liked it. We showed Pixar’s UP what an amazing movie. We had to do something indoors because of the weather but I really liked it we may do it again next year.

What should I do different next year?

Sometimes I think we tend to romanticize the past. I remember thinking that cartoons were so much better when I was a kid and so I would let my boys watch bugs bunny unsupervised because I watched it when I was a kid. Then one day I walked by and heard one of the characters on the bugs bunny cartoon swear. Crazy right. I couldn’t believe it. I have since come to realize that being a good and vigilant parent has always been in style while what we have to look out for to protect our kids changes from generation to generation the reality is that we always need to know what are kids are doing. This is not so we can control their environment but so that we can look for teachable moments to help them learn the process of good Godly decision making.

Here is a sample of a tv commercial from the 50′s or 60′s I think that would necessitate some follow-up conversations.

I listen to A LOT of kids music. I have some I like more than others. One of the things I remember about kids music when I was a kid was that quite a bit of it was scripture based. There is so much good christian worship/music out there for kids but I started thinking the other day that there isn’t a large amount of really cool scripture based worship songs. Using music to teach theology has been something the church has used for hundreds of years.

Enter the Rizers – not only in their music bible based but their music is very current your kids will love it. Actually you will love it. I think I listen to it more than my boys. With catchy music and no miss lyrics buying the Rizers for your kids is a no brainier.

I loved the whole CD they do a great job picking scriptures that go along with some of the things kids struggle with most, fear, loving others, and many more. You can buy the whole album on amazon for just 7.99.

Don’t believe me? Listen to a few full length samples yourself.