Crickets chirp.
Little feet scurry with excitement.
The green-glowing light tags on tiny silhouettes moving along a paved trail look like fireflies dancing in the dark.
Thirty-three pre-schoolers from Creative O Preschoolers’ Bay – carrying backpacks, water bottles and torchlights – are on an immersive exploration to spot nocturnal critters far away from home.
The six-year-olds are on St John’s Island, 6.5km off the southern coast of Singapore, on a three-day, two-night camping trip from Sept 20 to 22 – without their parents.
The pre-school, which was established in 1998, started its first offshore camping tradition for its graduating Kindergarten 2 cohort on Pulau Ubin in 2000.
The trips were held on St John's Island from 2002.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the school observed safety regulations and held the camps in school at Jurong East without any overnight stays.
This year, its signature offshore camp is the first since 2020.
Creative O was founded by its principal Tan Beng Luan and supported by the late Creative Technology founder Sim Wong Hoo, both of whom shared a mutual quest to cultivate a creative space for locals to invent, imagine and innovate.
For many of the children, the camping trip is their first time away from their parents.
During the send-off, Madam Cindy Xin (below), 39, has mixed feelings saying goodbye to her son, Adam Taufiq Sjaichudin.
However, she values the school’s approach to education – learning through exploration and play – and believes it is beneficial for children in the long run.
“The kids learn how to be responsible and supportive; to love and to learn. I think it is really important for them to have a strong curiosity towards nature and the people around them, as well as learn how to develop a bond with others,” she says.
While parents do not follow the children to the camp, they are prepared via a pre-trip briefing by the staff in August.
The school has also tailored its programmes to prepare the children, as early as Kindergarten 1, to be physically and mentally ready for the graduation camp.
Seven months before the camp, the children were taught to ride bicycles and progressively managed to cycle up to 5km – from Kallang Wave Mall to Gardens by the Bay – to improve their endurance and resilience in hot weather.
In July, the teachers also started to engage the children in pre-camp activities.
With teachers providing assistance and guidance throughout the process, the children worked on the menu and packing list, came up with a timetable and duty roster, planned activities, and learnt safety and environment awareness and the “dos and don’ts” of camping.
Recipes for soupy bee hoon with sausages and carrots were “test cooked” in school.
Pre-camp discussion in class also included the children’s concerns over sinking ferries and getting “hit by hurricanes”.
They also found out that wearing life vests is meant to protect them.
During the ferry ride from Marina South Pier to St John’s Island, the children get “creative” with the plastic bags that are meant for nausea due to seasickness.
The logistics are massive – over 30 large boxes and bags filled with cleaning, bathing, food and medical supplies have to be ferried over to the island.
Accompanying the children are Ms Tan, four teachers, nine volunteers, three camp instructors and one support staff member from Two.kii Adventures, a camp organiser specialising in children camps.
The pre-schoolers set up their own sleeping bags.
They brush their teeth along the drain, as only a handful of adult-height basins are on site.
They prepare and cook meals.
The pre-schoolers wash their own utensils after every meal, using a bucket of soapy water and two buckets of clean water for rinsing.
They organise their own clothing, sweep the floor and wipe tables.
It is a challenge every night for the teachers and volunteers to get all the children ready for bed every night. Water has to be manually boiled and mixed into pails for bathing, teeth are brushed along the drains and extra manpower is needed to help the ones with long hair dry their tresses.
During the day, they get active, jumping over drains and climbing trees…
... crawling through fences and climbing steep slopes…
… dressing up for water play with the adults.
For Ms Tan, the principal, a huge part of learning comes from undergoing the process.
“Telling them does not work. If we allow the children to experience and draw their own conclusions, they learn why some things are not practical,” says the 69-year-old.
For instance, the children learn that the more elaborate a meal is, the more ingredients they will have to bring.
One of the camp highlights is a night hike on St John’s Island. Heavy rain in the afternoon almost gets the hike this year cancelled, but the teachers and camp instructor Foo goes ahead and takes a safer route instead.
Ms Tan believes that children should be exposed to new experiences within age-appropriate limits, so they have opportunities to learn to care for themselves and become independent. “When they push themselves, they realise that it is not so difficult and they can overcome it. So Guo Liang’s slogan is: You try, and try, and you don’t cry.”
Ms You Bik Ru, the teacher in charge of this year’s camp, regards the teachers as facilitators.
“When given the chance during the camp, the children’s problem-solving skills come through as they encourage and support one another,” says the 35-year-old.
“They gain a sense of confidence and belief when they complete their tasks and challenges. That’s the biggest change I see, besides a tighter bond between the children and teachers after the camp,” says Ms You.
Perhaps the biggest endorsement of the annual survive-and-thrive camp and its lifelong treasured experience comes from the participants themselves.
When the school held its 25th anniversary celebrations in 2022, alumni who are now in their late teens and 20s returned to visit and almost all mentioned two especially unforgettable memories – the sumptuous meals at the pre-school and the K2 camp.
Ms Rebecca Heng (below), 18, graduated in 2011 and often goes back to the school to visit the teachers.
“I had a lot of happy memories at Creative O. The most memorable experience was learning how to take out the gills of the fish... I was pulling and screaming. But in the end, we got to eat the fish. That was the great part,” she says.