November 14, 2011
Her Very First Ride
For little girls, taking their first equestrian lesson can be a mix of excitement and nervous jitters. It’s exciting because horseback riding seems so fun when you read about it or see it in movies, but for your first riding lesson, it can easily be a little overwhelming. There is so much to learn— special clothes, important safety rules, riding gear for the horse, how to mount, different riding positions, and communicating with your horse. The horses and ponies can seem so huge! And there is a lot to remember all at once.
That’s why it’s so important that a girl’s first experience learning to horseback ride be a safe, caring, gentle introduction. It’s crucial that her instructor be experienced working with small children, that he or she be kind and patient, and that the pony be calm and gentle in the ring. Taking small steps, gradually gaining confidence and greater understanding, is the best way to maintain a girl’s enthusiasm for riding. The best children’s horseback riding centers know how to pace this kind of progression.
The equestrian program at Rockbrook Camp has a long history of introducing young girls to horseback riding. Camp has just the right combination of skilled instructors and gentle ponies, enthusiasm for riding, and great equestrian facilities to encourage girls on their very first ride. At camp, we’re well prepared to make every girl’s first horseback riding experience a positive one. It’s the perfect recipe for a life-long love of horses and horseback riding!
November 7, 2011
Healthy Kids Get Outdoors
There’s a new bill introduced in the US Senate that authorizes “the Secretary of the Interior to carry out [state and local] programs and activities that connect Americans, especially children, youth, and families, with the outdoors.” It’s called the Healthy Kids Outdoors Act of 2011 and was introduced by Senator Mark Udall of Colorado, and co-sponsored in the House of Representatives by Rep. Ron Kind of Wisconsin.
Prompting this legislation is a growing concern that American children are increasingly sedentary, spending most of their time indoors, and overweight. A wide range of studies show our kids are addicted to electronic media, watching on average 7.5 hours per day. Obesity and its related health problems are closely related to this. And now, seeing that kids are spending on average less than 10 minutes a day in unstructured outdoor play, an alarming trend is appearing. There’s even some worry that an unhealthy American population would be a national security threat given how many overweight people would be disqualified from military service.
The Healthy Kids Outdoors Act would combat these trends by funding state and local organizations in their efforts to get kids outdoors, to encourage active outdoor experiences. Here too, studies show outdoor activity yielding incredible public health, local economic and national conservation benefits. Seeking these benefits, this legislation would provide up to $15 million dollars of matching funds to sponsor programs and infrastructure that effectively connect Americans, especially kids, with outdoor experiences.
Of course, we are cheering this legislation! At an outdoor summer camp like Rockbrook, we know and celebrate the wonders of outdoor experience everyday. We spend most of our time (not just 10 minutes!) outside, actively engaged in dozens of activities.
At camp, we know all about the benefits to kids of outdoor activity. It’s nice to see those same benefits being championed nationally.
November 6, 2011
Look at us and you will see, the very best Pets have we!
Since the beginning of their fall travels on the road, Sofie and Frampton have had so much fun hanging out with RBC girls and their pets! Big dogs, little dogs, crazy cats, lazy cats, and even a pair of very social guinea pigs (One named “Chocolate” and the other named “Chip”), Rockbrook girls call a variety of different animals family members. In fact, camper Elley from Montgomery, AL is such an animal lover that she had her birthday party at the Humane Society! When preparing to come to camp, the thought of leaving behind your pet for a few weeks can bring a smidge of sadness, so when settling into the cabin on Opening Day, you’ll find that lots of campers bring photos of their furry best friends to Rockbrook. Below are some of our favorite pet portraits!
 Heathie and Jake |  Rebecca's dog, Doc |
 Sofie, Emma, Cody, and Frampton pose with Snickers |  Campers McAuley, Elley, and Rosemary love Winston, their Golden Retriever |
November 4, 2011
Dude, Do you Extrude?
One of the ceramics hand-building techniques we teach in Rockbrook pottery classes is extruding. This involves creating clay forms, or consistent shapes, by pressing clay through an extruder, a simple hand-powered machine. An extruder is really a piston of sorts operated by a lever. On one end of the piston’s cylinder is a wooden or metal plate called a die. Different dies have different shapes cut out of them. The whole thing works by filling the cylinder with clay, and pulling the lever of the extruder, thereby forcing the piston to push the clay through the die, and out in the shape of the cutout. It takes muscles to pull that lever, but it’s so cool to see the extruded clay come out!
Some dies extrude circular tubes, but there are also square, hexagonal and octagonal tubes as well. You can extrude slabs, coils and even half-spherical shapes. Extruders are great at making long, even forms of clay.
Of course, these shapes then can become the building blocks for more complex hand-building projects. Extruded clay can be combined to make really complex sculptures, for example when extruded tubes are cut at different angles and joined to make multi-sided vessels.
And don’t forget glazing and firing these pieces. Like all the pottery and ceramics projects at camp, the results are beautiful! Yep, at Rockbrook, we do extrude.
October 31, 2011
Friendship Animation Video
The digital photography activity at camp is always coming up with new projects and games for the girls, different ways to incorporate taking (making!) pictures with other active ideas. It might be a scavenger hunt, a color or texture study, or simply a collage of some sort. One cool example of this is making a stop-motion animation video. This involves taking a series of photographs and stringing them together in a sequence. If the objects in the scene change slightly in each picture, the resulting video looks like they are moving. One way to do this is to build something out of play-doh, a snowman for example. Using this stop-motion animation technique, you can make a video where the snowman comes to life!
Here’s an example of this technique used to create the illusion of people moving. This past summer, Hannah, Briana and Catherine made this short video about friendship. You can really tell they had a great time making it. Take a look!
October 28, 2011
Are You A Kayaking Girl?
Are you a kayaking girl? Do you love fitting all the gear— helmet, PFD, skirt, and paddle —and squeezing into the boat? And the best of all, do you love getting out on the river and playing in the rapids? Catching eddies, surfing waves, and just playing on the water?
Maybe you do, or maybe you’ve always wanted to, but either way camp is the perfect place for kayaking. For example, just about every day down at the Rockbrook lake, girls enjoy kayaking classes. One of the camp whitewater staff members will be teaching basic paddling techniques, but also important skills like steering your boat, controlling your paddle, and learning what to do if you capsize your kayak. If you know all this, it’s still fun to get out on the lake and practice your stuff, and if you’ve never worked on your roll, then this is a great way to get started learning it.
In addition to kayaking on our lake, Rockbrook girls are running the local whitewater rivers too! Every week we offer several day kayaking trips to the Green, Tuckaseegee, French Broad or Nantahala rivers. This is a chance to take the skills learned at the lake and put them to use on moving water, to learn more about reading the rivers (“downstream V !”), and honing your ferrying and eddying techniques. Around here, every kayak girl is having a blast!
October 19, 2011
From Faraway Cities to Distant Towns
With the fall season underway, Frampton and Sofie have hit the road traveling around the States! Stopping in various cities to host camp parties and camper reunions, they have had so much fun hanging out with Rockbrook girls during the school-year. On their most recent trip, Frampton and Sofie traveled to Wilmington, NC and got to spend part of their afternoon tossing the frisbee on the beach with camper Peyton! An avid frisbee thrower, Peyton’s skills put Frampton and Sofie to work! Afterwards, everyone met up at campers Zella and Liza Jane’s house for the camp party. After spending the afternoon at the beach and the evening in the company of dear Rockbrook friends, Sofie and Frampton couldn’t have asked for a better trip. Check the website to see if there’s a camp party near you. We’d love to see you there!
 Frampton, Peyton, and Sofie take a break from throwing the frisbee at the beach! |  Frampton, Peyton, Sofie, Zella, and Liza Jane pose for a quick picture after the camp party |
October 17, 2011
2011 Photo Yearbook Published
This fall as we travel around to our camp slide show parties, we’ve got something cool to show you— our new yearbook of photos collected from last summer. It’s an awesome full-color, bound photo book showing some of our favorite shots from all three sessions. There are 112 pages and more than 200 camp photos in all! Hit that Fullscreen icon and enjoy!
Don’t forget to tell your friends about the book by hitting that share icon!
