Budding Experts is our student-led, monthly interview series highlighting young people and the fun things they learn about during our programs. At Camp Fire, campers learn about outdoor activities, art, STEM, and the environment from trained specialists and instructors.  

Did you know that our environmental education curriculum is based on the Minnesota Department of Education STEM standards and social emotional learning (SEL) competencies? That means that at Camp Fire, youth strengthen their knowledge of the objectives they learn at school, becoming budding experts.  

Check out what our campers have been learning this past month! 

Young campers learned fun facts about a variety of bat species, such as the California leaf-nosed bat and the lesser long-nosed bat, through a coloring activity designed by Bat Conservation International.  

Meleah: Hi, I’m Meleah! This is Isabella, Jayda, Gemma, and Charlie, and we’re at Camp Fire. Today, we’re talking about bats. Isabella, what do you know about bats? Like, what do they eat?  

Isabella: Um, they eat all types of insects—that’s what the smaller ones eat. Also, their eyesight is not very clear, so they use echolocation to see.   

Meleah: Where is their habitat?  

Jayda: I feel like, in dark places, kind of. 

Meleah: What type of dark areas?  

Jayda: Inside of probably, like, caves, or somewhere there’s not much, like, people going there, so they can like, chill, I guess.  

Gemma: What do you know about bats?  

Charlie: Um, they’re sort of blind. They eat all types of insects. They eat berries. They eat a lot of stuff. There’s a ton of different types. 

(According to Bat Conservation International, there are more than 1,400 species of bats around the world). 

Gemma: Something I know about bats is that there are maybe around 10 different species in Minnesota.  

(There are eight native species of bats in Minnesota!) 

Meleah: Something I know about bats is that they sleep in the morning, like during the day, and then they’re up at night.  

Shrimp the Photographer: And where did you all learn this from?  

Everyone: The nature center, with Coyote!  

Shoutout to Coyote, our Nature Specialist, for leading this week’s lessons on bats, as well as our naturalist team for creating the curriculum! Check out our education page to explore all the learning opportunities Camp Fire offers year round.