To most it might seem like yesterday’s trash, but the cardboard boxes, pipe cleaners, plastic lids and coffee filters that filled the room of recycled materials were just the building blocks of creation for the children at Camp Invention last week at Whitefish Middle School.

Students in first through sixth grades participated in the week-long camp focused on the development of creative, inventive-thinking skills and exploring the connections between science, technology, engineering and innovation. The campers rotated through four different modules incorporating a variety of hands-on activities. This was the first year Whitefish schools hosted a Camp Invention program and 120 students participated.

“They get to be loud and creative in an entirely different way than in school,” said Sarah Akey, camp director and Muldown Elementary teacher. “It opens the door to creativity because it’s open-ended.”

Last year, Camp Invention was held at about 1,300 sites across the country with 97,000 children participating. Camp Invention is a nonprofit that began first in Akron, Ohio, schools in 1990 as an outreach program.

At the Whitefish camp there were 26 volunteer mentors made up of middle and high school students.

Jennifer Watson, assistant camp director and teacher, said many of the campers get excited about the simplest parts of the day. Campers were excited just going into the recycled materials room searching out their supplies and then using tools like screw drivers to take apart electronics.

“They go in there and find anything they want, to build anything they can imagine,” she said. “They’re so excited to go home and tell their parents about how cool and fun it was. They can’t wait to come back after lunch and keep working.”

In the maker studio, campers take apart electronic devises and then power up their own inventions. In CrickoBot, campers make and adopt their own robotic cricket powered by the sun and then create cricket-inspired inventions.

Inside the games room, teacher Kayla Ryan started a session by having campers play a game that had them hold hands in a circle and then attempt to pass a hula hoop around the group by passing their entire body through the hoop without letting go of each other. Two different teams worked as fast as they could to make the hoop go around the circle. When they finished, she asked, what worked and what didn’t.

“You had to put your foot first and then your head,” one camper said. Other campers offered up their suggestions, like working as a team.

“Good work,” Ryan told them. “Now let’s try it again and put to use what you learned.”

Amongst shouts and laughter the campers ran the hoops around their circles again.

Following the game, Ryan asked her campers to sit on the floor of the classroom and brainstorm about how to make a “fly swatter” to hit a pingpong ball the farthest. What kind of materials could you use? Cardboard and plastic. How many pieces do you need? Two — a handle and an end to hit the ball, along with tape to hold it together.

“Do you know your mission?” she asked. “Yes,” the campers replied. Then she sent them to the recycled materials to gather their items for fly swatters.

Many campers used pieces of cardboard for the swatter end along with plastic handle from toy pieces. Others used large foam circles or plastic container lids for the swatters. One camper created a golf club-style swatter out of foam to hit the ball along the ground. Once the parts and pieces had been taped and shaped together, the students headed outside.

In front of the middle school, the campers tested out their swatters. Small hands grasped the white pingpong balls before tossing them high in the air. Then holding onto their swatter they wound up striking the ball with as much force as they could muster.

After a few minutes of practice, the campers lined up on the sidewalk for a fly swatter competition. They would hit the pingpong ball as far as possible, to see who’s swatter came out the best for strength and distance.

Back inside, campers in the lab room were learning about squid. Some were shaping the anatomy of a squid out of clay, while others fashioned a device to catch a toy squid in a bucket of water. Three campers raced to suck up purple “squid ink” in straws.

“They’re learning about marine biology,” teacher Bonnie Hannigan explained. “They’re learning the parts of the squid. They’re learning about squid ink and how squid use it to protect themselves. They’re learning how squid lay thousands of eggs in one place.”

On one edge of the room, four campers lined up with their bellies on the carpeted floor. Poised with straws in their mouths and a small plastic ball in front of them, a mentor said go. They blew and blew through the straws moving the balls across the floor to the finish line. First across was the winner of the “squid egg” race.