Summer camps keeping Lynn students busy

LYNN ? At these summer camps, you may be making lunch one minute and doing someone’s hair the next.Middle schoolers from all over Lynn and high schoolers at Lynn Vocational Technical Institute (LVTI) gather for the third annual Camp Tiger, for LVTI high school students, and Camp Explore, for any Lynn junior high schoolers, which are summer day camps where students get the chance to read, practice sports and learn something about various trades.Camp Tiger is different from other camps, such as Lynn English’s Camp Bulldog and Lynn Classical’s Ram Camp, because it’s not specifically a sports camp. Kids work on all kinds of skills at camps Tiger and Explore. Activities include cooking, reading exercises, electronics, cosmetology, early childhood education, TV media production, swimming, culinary arts, basketball, wiffle ball, frisbee, bocce, art projects and many others.?This year we received over 230 applications for the camps,” said camp coordinator Marilyn Iarrobino. “Not everyone comes for the whole entire program, though. Each day we average about 140 kids.”The camp isn’t just popular with the kids ? faculty members like it, too. Iarrobino said that 48 members of the faculty applied to be teachers in the camp, but that there were only positions for 20.According to Iarrobino, each junior high school in the city used to have its own camp for their students, but they have since all been rolled into one at LVTI as Camp Explore.One of the main activities for the kids are reading exercises in which kids read their summer reading book in groups and discuss in-depth the underlying themes and lessons in the book.?This year we’re reading ?Med Head,'” said camp teacher Kevin Ankiewicz. “It’s a true story about a boy who struggled with Tourette syndrome. It shows the kids that if you have a kind of problem like this, how you would be able to overcome it to be able to be in the workforce or school. We help them with their projects, and they come up with questions and ideas about the book. This book is good because it was edited specifically with group lessons in mind.”Ankiewicz said that the reading groups are all broken up separately according to the kids’ reading skill levels.Campers Dylan Hover, Oliver Brooks, Trevor Shaw, David Marte and Aiden Graciale were outside of the LVTI gym learning how to play bocce ball from LVTI history teacher Adolf Graciale.?I never played bocce ball before,” said Marte. “We also play wiffle ball, soccer, frisbee, kickball and go swimming.”Camp swim instructor Helen Ridley was in charge of the free swim time Tuesday.?If the kids are interested in learning how to swim, then we give them lessons or teach them other useful water safety skills, like treading water, but we always go over the basics beforehand, otherwise they mostly just have free swim and play around in the pool,” said Ridley. “What kid doesn’t like that?”The camps run until Aug. 8, and registration is closed.