Laughter, music and the sounds of dancing could be heard coming from The Augusta Players last week and this week thanks to Camp Wonderland.
Camp Wonderland, a two-week for young people with special needs, is in its 10th year, said Allison Johnson, Camp Wonderland director. The idea for Camp Wonderland, a program of The Augusta Players, came from Laura Thomas, who years ago ran the Junior Players program. There was a group in Atlanta for a competition, and she saw a group of kids on the autism spectrum perform.
“She thought, ‘that’s so beautiful, I want to figure out a way to somehow implement a program,’” said Johnson. “She kind of got her wheels spinning and went to Debi Ballas, who was the executive director prior to Scott (Seidl), and kind of proposed her idea. Debi loved it and that’s how Camp Wonderland came to be.”
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The camp is broken up into four classes: art, music, drama and movement. The campers are divided into four groups and rotate through each class every day, Johnson said. At the end of the two weeks, the campers will perform a showcase for their parents to show what they worked on at the camp.
“Each group will do something from each class that they’ve learned,” Johnson said. “Most of the time in drama they’ll write their own skit that they’ll perform that. For movement, she teaches them different dances to things. Then they do these amazing, our art teacher is phenomenal…they do these beautiful art projects she displays for everyone. Music, it’ll just be something that each class has decided that this is what perform well and want to do.”
One thing Johnson she loves is seeing the campers work in groups, because she said people on the autism spectrum don’t to a lot of group activities, so seeing them participate is a wonderful thing.
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“I think that’s somehow one of the ways, with it being an arts thing, they’ll sit in this group together and all play the same instrument of play the same song or do the same dance,” Johnson said. “It’s just so special to see (because) it’s not something you see that often. We have parents all the time, they’ll come on the first day and be like this isn’t going to work and then the last day they’ll be up there doing their thing.”
Johnson said her favorite thing about the camp is the buddy system, which is similar to the Buddy Club found in schools. She previously worked in special education at the high school level for 10 years, so when she started with The Augusta Players, she brough up the idea of the Buddy Club to The Augusta Players.
“I thought hey, why don’t we call them buddies because that’s a word that everyone is familiar with,” Johnson said. “Families understand it, kids understand it…These kids are amazing, they come and volunteer these two weeks of their time and it’s a lot. We ask a lot of them…but it’s beautiful, they just build these bonds with the kids. We have a number of them come back year after year. We’ve had several that have started as young people as buddies, went through school, went to college. I have two that have gotten their special education degrees. One just finished her first year of teaching, she’s one of the group leaders now, and the other is about to start her first year of teaching… The camp wouldn’t work without them, it just wouldn’t.”
The limit for the camp is 30 kids and that’s how many are participating this year. Johnson said anyone can participate and registration is on a first-come, first-serve basis. She added there is a cost to attend the camp, but The Augusta Players offers financial aid to help.
Information on registration can be found on The Augusta Players website and social media.
