I'm in the middle of a four-day camp week, which just seems too short. I've given up on trying to cram five days worth of instruction into four days of camp. The kids have already had their Star testing anyway, and I don't think those happen again until the 8th grade or so. We are finding lots of snakes, salamanders, and other creatures that start with "s", and I think the kids will remember that more than lessons on photosynthesis or energy flow. Today I found, in quick succession, a Rattlesnake, a Ringneck snake, and a Gopher snake. I managed to get covered in ticks while doing it, so every minute or so a kid would point to me and say, "there's another tick!" At least now they all know what ticks look like. I think I got them all off me but I still have the phantom crawling sensation one associates with small arachnids pushing their way through a forest of body hair. Too bad they don't hurt when they bite. Of course, if they did hurt when they bit, they wouldn't ever live to breed.