GICEL Camp Information
Updated August 14, 2024
Thank you so much for a wonderful season of our Summer Earth Education Program (SEEP) for children 6-12 years of age on Pender Island, Mayne Island, and Saturna Island.
If you’d like to be on our email list for updates regarding GICEL programs next year, please complete this GICEL Camp Updates google form.
If you’d like to be on our email list for updates regarding GICEL programs next year, please complete this GICEL Camp Updates google form.
Seedlings Early Years Nature Day Camp – We are working on the possibility of offering Seedlings, a half-day program for 3-5-year-olds on Mayne Island, again. Depending on many factors, the camp may or may not go ahead this year. As the planning proceeds, we will continue to update this page. For further updates, please email Karen at mayne@gicel.ca if you would like to be added to the Seedlings email list.
Registration process:
Registration is “opened” when the link to the GICEL Registration Form (a google form) is added to the website and made active; registration is accepted on a first come, first served basis. Upon completing and submitting the form, you will receive an automatic reply to acknowledge receipt of your responses.
To ensure a quality experience for all involved, our capacity for each camp is 30 participants. Registrations received after a camp has reached capacity will be automatically put on a waiting list. If a spot becomes available, you will be contacted directly.
Confirmation of registration and further camp information, including how to pay camp fees, will be emailed within three weeks of registration.
*Please note that the camps often fill within 24 hours of registration opening!*
Camp fees:
Registration for one week is $250, including a GICEL t-shirt.
Subsidies are available for families who may require financial assistance. Once registration is confirmed, please contact us for more information.
For more information regarding:
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Mayne Island camps, please email Karen Begley at mayne@gicel.ca
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Saturna Island camp, please email saturna@gicel.ca
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Pender Islands camp, please email Andrea Mills at pender@gicel.ca
If you are not already receiving emails from GICEL and would like to be informed of when the registration dates will be, please complete this “GICEL Camp Updates” google form.
Thank you for your support!
The Gulf Island Centre for Ecological Learning
Programs:
Summer Earth Education Program
Grouped in clans such as the Roaring Rockhoppers or the Tree Clan, participants in our Summer Earth Education programs (SEEP) explore together, study together and play together in the forests, freshwater and marine environments of the Gulf Islands. Components of the Gulf Islands National Park Reserve, Burgoyne Bay Provincial Park as well as regional and community parks found on each of Salt Spring, Pender, Mayne and Saturna islands are the venues for the 2010 programs. The clans create their identity and build forts which are their base of operations for the week-long programs. Using rotations and activity centres, participants have hands-on experience in understanding forest ecosystem dynamics, multi-sensory explorations, bird communities, food chains and food pyramids, animal behaviour, energy flows in ecosystems, journaling and self-reflection. Specifically designed games to re-enforce the concepts and activities have children role-playing as prey, predators, salmon, and orcas, to name a few.
Specific studies are done on forest decomposition and the soil cycle, intertidal zonation and freshwater aquatic organisms’ lifecycles. Each island program includes sessions led by specialists in certain fields including forest bird communities, forage fish ecology, watershed dynamics and salmon survival, as well as First Nations storytelling and use of resources. Participants also spend time collecting, identifying and recording various organisms found within forest, freshwater and marine ecosystems according to their place in the food chain.
Music is an integral part of each day’s opening and closing ceremonies in which the participants learn new songs about the natural world around them. At the end of the week’s program, individualized certificates of achievement are presented to each participant at our closing ceremony.
This PDF file details a typical day with GICEL.
Seedlings Early Years Nature Day Camp
Seedlings Early Years Nature Day Camp is a week-long outdoor, play-based program (mornings only) which offers young children an opportunity to explore, learn and grow together in nature. It takes place every summer on a secluded private property (the coordinator’s home-place on Mayne Island) that provides both field and forest environments for the children’s outdoor adventures.
The emphasis is on social, affectionate, play-based and creative learning, with a focus on sensory experiences in nature: listening, looking, touching, tasting, singing, laughing, digging, climbing, running, swinging, building, eating, sharing, story-telling, painting, sculpting, and – did we mention? – playing! We warn everyone beforehand that the children will get Very Dirty! And they do… We all make new friends and greet old ones with joy, sing songs, paint rocks and sticks and add to the wall-mural. We read books and tell stories, paint faces (and arms and legs and other bits), build and decorate a woodland fort, eat frequent snacks, explore the garden, play games in the field and make expeditions into the forest.
This PDF file will give you more information about the Seedlings Program.
GICEL Connections
The Gulf Island Center for Ecological Learning (GICEL) is now offering a free online summer mini-camp experience for 2020. Connect with nature by engaging in fun, ecology-themed activities and connect on-line with friends & leaders with the new GICEL Connections program!
Check out our new GICEL Connections webpage for open content created by GICEL leaders, coordinators and community members. Ecology themed activities, video explorations & tutorials, and more will be posted weekly – check back regularly to see what has been added!
Explore the activities on the webpage and post any of your experiences and creations to our Facebook page.
Join the weekly GICEL Connection Sessions via Zoom on Tuesday and Friday at 10:00 am PDT throughout August!
During the 30 minute session on Tuesday, participants will have a chance to connect with each other & GICEL leaders, enjoy some fun camp experiences, and learn about the week’s themed challenge to get outside and explore your local green spaces.
On Friday, we will gather again to share what you’ve discovered!
Click photos below to enlarge:
