Our Savior Lutheran Church

 

Outdoor Adventures

Finding God’s Treasure
This event is a team building scavenger hunt that will allow the campers to solve a mystery as they hike through the various portions of West Branch Forest Preserve.  The campers will be divided into small groups and given a specific responsibility that will be necessary in solving the mystery.  Finding God’s Treasure will be an all day event starting with an introduction and explanation at the church.  We will have a picnic lunch at the forest preserve and enjoy an exciting day in God’s beautiful creation.
 

Hiking at West Branch Forest Preserve and Exploring God's Creation
Following the mystery of Finding God’s Treasure, we will hike at West Branch every other week for a total of 4 more hikes.  Each day will have a specific lesson plan with an interactive activity.  The lesson plans are as follows:

Nature Scavenger Hunt
Given a list of 20 items, the campers will search for as many of them as they can find in the given amount of time. 

Footprints
The campers will search for animal footprints in the preserve, and using plaster of paris, they will make a mold of the footprint to keep as a fossil.

Leaves and Plants
After collecting leaves and different soils, the campers will observe how and why leaves change color as well as experiment with how well plants grow in different types of soils.

Microscopes
The campers will collect water samples from the pond, swamp and river at West Branch and then observe the many and varied organisms within each type of water under a microscope.

Overnight camping retreat at Blackwell Forest Preserve
The enthusiasm of last year’s overnight camping retreat was felt by both camper and counselor alike, and we are excited for another camping trip. The overnight camping retreat is open to all campers going into 4th – 8th grade.  The plan is for us to go to Blackwell Forest Preserve to go canoeing; those camping will stay at Blackwell overnight, be picked up Friday morning, and head back to Our Savior for the rest of the day.  There will be a separate information packet sent out in early June.  For those interested, please write “overnight” on the registration schedule form.