This week Troy University‘s Department of Theatre and Dance is allowing children to explore their creative side at the Summer Spotlight Creative Drama Camp.

“Creative drama is actually about the very free play and creative stuff, make believe, pretend, making up stories, those kinds of things that children, that we all, did naturally when we were younger it’s really playing on that,” says Theatre and Dance Chair Tori Averett. “Then we do some theatrics like we do some things where they rehearse or they build things or they work with lighting. So they do some theater but that’s not really the focus of the week. The focus is getting them to think creatively and using their imaginations and working with their friends.”

Working with friends is an element that Averett says is important for this age group because of what they missed out on during the pandemic.

“It’s always important for children to be allowed to be a little free,” says Averett. “Not run wild but express themselves and kind of find their voices and their personalities and kind of figure things out. They learn by doing so this is a very hands-on doing week so it’s always important. I think right now it’s especially important, because as we know, we’ve had some time here where we haven’t been able to be together and exchange ideas and work and play together as much. So I think it’s pretty critical right now. We’re playing some catch up from a couple of years of young people not being able to be together and free.”

For the full story watch Savannah’s report.