How Does Camp Invention Prepare Students for the Future?

Now more than ever, it is crucial that students become equipped to navigate unpredictable situations, tolerate ambiguity and identify novel solutions to complex problems.

While traditional classroom curricula remain vital to students’ learning experience, 21st-century competency skills continue to gain importance. These skills include problem solving, critical thinking, collaboration and various writing, numeracy and technology literacies.

Simplifying 21st-Century Skills With Camp Invention

Informed by over 30 years of experience working with the world’s most accomplished inventors to develop engaging STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) programs, the National Inventors Hall of Fame^® has identified qualities that make up the powerful mindset our Inductees have used to change the world. We call it the I Can Invent^® Mindset.

The nine essential skills and traits that make up this mindset not only unlock creative potential, but also provide educators with a simplified roadmap for helping prepare children for the future, creating readiness for a college-going path, a career journey and life in general.

In this summer’s all-new Camp Invention^® program, Illuminate, children have the opportunity to practice and cultivate each of the I Can Invent Mindset components as they dive into four unique, themed experiences.

In the Game^™

As children team up for athletic innovation, they get hands-on with science, build entrepreneurial skills and learn how to protect their creations.

STEM: Students engage in hands-on materials science as they investigate sports ball design, then discover physics concepts including air pressure, force, momentum and motion by engineering their own light-up ball game.

Entrepreneurship: By building a brand around their game, students uncover basic enterprise principles, determine a target audience for their product and consider what consumers in different markets might look like.

Intellectual Property: As students develop a name and logo designs for their game, they learn about the importance of their innovative identity and protecting their rights as a creator.

Let’s Glow^™

Exploring biophysics, optics and electrical engineering, children learn about illuminating inventions and engineer a one-of-a-kind Glow Box.

STEM: Students discover genetic engineering and the physics of light as they investigate the functionality of LEDs, fiber optics and even glowing animals.

Persistence: When constructing their Glow Box, students develop perseverance, determination and ingenuity as they wire a circuit to make their LEDs glow and their colorful designs shine.

Design Thinking: As students customize their Glow Box, they practice design thinking, applying real-world problem-solving techniques and building critical thinking skills.

Operation: HydroDrop^™

Children make global connections as they set out on an epic operation to solve water challenges around the world.

Creative Problem Solving: Students draw upon their unique ideas to identify actual water challenges and problems facing our world, developing innovative answers to everyday problems and complex challenges.

Confidence: As students realize they can affect change through their thoughts and actions, they become self-assured creators, able to take on obstacles and turn their ideas into reality.

STEM: From reverse engineering their lab-on-wheels to studying water quality to exploring marine technology, students apply STEM concepts to create a better future for people and the planet.

Prototyping Studio^™

Children star in a prototyping game show where they embark on an innovative journey to discover the ultimate place to invent.

Confidence: While prototyping with everyday materials, making invention accessible to every kind of learner, students build trust in their abilities by bringing their own ideas from their heads to their hands and out into the real world.

Design Thinking: As students move from space to space in a simulated game show, they’re encouraged to identify problems and seek solutions, focusing on how inventions can improve the lives of others.

Innovation: Engaging in hands-on challenges, students explore the places, tools and techniques used by accomplished inventors and discover what innovation can look like in their own lives.

Learn More About the Benefits of Camp Invention

Visit our website to learn more about this summer’s exciting, all-new Camp Invention program and how it can prepare your students to overcome challenges, now and in the future.