Children's Folk Activities Area


Games and activities will be ongoing throughout the day, Saturday & Sunday, 12 noon - 6 p.m.

At the Great Lakes Folk Festival, children (and their adult companions) can take part in a variety of fun, participatory, and educational activities. The Children's Folk Activities Area is located on the far western side of the festival site in Valley Court Park and runs from noon to 6:00 P.M. Saturday and Sunday.

Children's Maritime Traditions

in the Great Lakes

Building sand castles on a beach, skipping stones across a lake, swimming, boating, making and floating toy boats, going fishing, participating in fishing contests, watching ocean-going freighters, finding Petoskey stones, and looking for bait-all are water-related traditions enjoyed by many kids living in the Great Lakes.

At this year's Great Lakes Folk Festival, children and their adult companions can take part in a variety of fun, participatory, educational, and on-going activities that celebrate our Great Lakes maritime folk traditions.


Model Boat Building Workshop
Build your own Great Lakes boat-a sailboat, tug, freighter, or other vessel and launch it in a testing pool. Make the boat from scratch using wood, plastic, cloth, cork, and other scraps and pieces. Will it float?

Knot Tying
Try your hand at tying some basic knots, bends and hitches. Learn to make a fancy knot or knotted craft. Make a knot board.

Fishing
Learn to rig and use a fishing pole, tie fishing knots, and make a tied fly for fly-fishing. Learn about other cool fishing stuff like decoys, tackle, worms, and bait, and kinds of fish.

Know Your Ships
Play the "know your ships" game and do some on-shore boatwatching. Navigate a ship through the Great Lakes and try using a lake chart.

Family Boat Names
Tell us the story behind the name of your family boat.

Talk Like a Sailor
Fun is "dead ahead" with this fun maritime word game that will get young sailors "shipshape" and ready for a Great Lakes cruise.

How to Sail
Learn the parts of a sailboat and how to sail.

Dockside Games
Numerous other crafts, games, and activities will also be available. Come join the fun!

Volunteers from maritime organizations will be on deck in the children's area to teach a variety of maritime skills, including: MSU Sailing Center, Michigan Fly Fishing Club, and Project F.I.S.H. (Friends Involved in Sportfishing Heritage). Parts of the curriculum from MSU Extension's Project F.I.S.H. and FOLKPATTERNS Programs, and from MSU Extension's and Michigan Sea Grant College Program's Great Lakes Education Program will also be used.


More about Children's Traditional Culture

Children's culture is mostly traditional. Even in infancy children begin participating in and learning traditional games such as peek-a-boo and patty-cake. Throughout childhood and adolescence they participate in traditional learning songs, rhymes, sayings, puzzles, rituals, customs and games with their peers, older youth, and adults. Although adults are clearly important teachers of all knowledge for children, much of children's traditions are passed on continuously from child to child; children are both the teachers and the learners. By the time children enter school they are already skilled in a wide realm of knowledge areas.