For Leaders: Young Women Camp Ideas
by Kiku Beaufort

Young Women camp can be the highlight of the summer for many girls, but it can be tricky for you to enjoy it too if you are completely consumed in the logistics of pulling off a successful camp. Here are some tips to help make the process a little easier on you so hopefully you can enjoy camp just as much as everyone else!

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Choosing a Theme

A theme will help unify all of the activities that go on at camp, and it will make it much easier for the leaders, speakers, and youth leaders to know how to prepare before camp begins. Themes often work best when they are taken from one of the following sources:

·Scriptures
·The Mutual theme
·Hymns
·Quotes from a prophet or another Church leader

When you are brainstorming ideas for the camp, keep in mind what the girls in your program are interested in, how many will be at camp, and where camp will be. More general themes work best for large stake camps because they allow you to break into different groups and assign a section of the theme to each ward in the stake.

Concentrating on Certification

Certification is a big part of camp, and it can be a fun learning experience for the girls if you spice it up.

First-aid and other certification topics can be taught prior to camp. Have a cooking night before camp starts with Dutch oven cooking or tin foil dinners. If you have access to a fire pit, teach the girls how to cook with a fire, and make s’mores for dessert. To put a twist on knot tying, have the girls learn using licorice rope.

Pre-Camp Preparation

The more the girls are involved in planning camp, the more they’ll enjoy it. Be sure to involve the youth camp leaders; they will be a great help in taking the stress off your shoulders. Plus, the younger girls most likely look up to them and will follow their lead.

Skit preparation is a fun pre-camp activity that gets the girls excited about camp. In a skit planning activity, the girls can gather in their tent groups and decide what kind of skit they would like to do. Because it is before camp, the young women can gather props and costumes to enhance their performance. This will also hopefully involve some of the less active young women who are still planning to come to camp.

Carrying out Camp

After all of the preparations are made, it’s time for camp to begin! Implement and stick to a regular schedule—it will help both leaders and girls to know what’s going on and what to anticipate.

A standard camp schedule may look like this:

7:00 a.m.: Wake-up call
7:30 a.m.: Roll call, prayer, YW theme, hymn, devotional, flag raising
8:00 a.m.: Breakfast
8:30 a.m.: Hikes for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd years, and 4th year certification
12:00 p.m.: Lunch, crafts, certification
3:00 p.m.: Free time (journals, read scriptures, etc.)
5:00 p.m.: Dinner
6:00 p.m.: Certification activities
7:00 p.m.: Performance of skits, leader presentations/talks
9:00 p.m.: Fireside talks and campfire singing
10:00 p.m.: Lights out

In all of the activities, songs, lessons, and fireside talks at camp, it helps to know exactly what the Church outlines as the purpose and idea behind everything that occurs at camp. It is stated in the Young Women’s Camp Manual that the goal of Girl’s Camp is to help your Young Women to:

·Feel the Spirit
·Build testimony
·Learn skills
·Build friendships
·Serve others
·Appreciate God’s creations
·Draw closer to God
·Have fun!

Some ideas to help you achieve these goals are to have a sacred grove at camp, where each afternoon you take time to go in to first hear a speaker and then to have a few minutes to reflect and write in journals. You can have scheduled solo experiences where the girls can go off on their own somewhere in nature to read their scriptures, reflect, ponder, pray, and write in their journals.

For more involved activities, you might consider having a “Walk with Christ” evening where priesthood leaders dress up as people from Christ’s time and the girls travel to each station where presentations are given. Another idea is to recreate Lehi’s vision. Use a fog machine to create mists of darkness and use a rope for the iron rod. At the end, each girl could be given a small white bag filled with scripture quotes and treats to represent the fruit.

Another idea is to have a daddy-daughter night where the fathers of your girls come to camp and spend one afternoon or night doing activities together. These might include fishing together, creating a craft together, or passing off certification activities together.

To add some variation to the normal girl’s camp skit night, you can give each group a bag full of craft supplies such as scissors, glue, feathers, pom poms, string, tape, markers, and ribbon. Tell each group to go to their tents and make an evening gown for one of the girls in their group to be presented in a beauty pageant that night. Tell them to select an MC and to prepare a talent as a group for the pageant. Then, have the pageant that night and give awards to each participant.

LDS Living Magazine, Mar/Apr Issue

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