Featured Events, Resources, & Opportunities

The Hilltown Community Development Corporation (Hilltown CDC) offers free, confidential business assistance to Hilltown residents. If you are thinking of starting or growing your business, the Hilltown CDC can help! And thanks to a generous grant from the MGCC, all of their business assistance is FREE. They have experts in a wide range of areas that can help Hilltown entrepreneurs get on their feet, including website help, social media marketing, business tax and accounting, legal assistance, and Assistance for Farmers! For more information, email Hilltown CDC Economic Development Director Michele Kenney at MicheleK@Hilltowncdc.org, or call 413-354-1055. Sign up for their free virtual classes at hilltowndirectory.com/events

Yoga Sanctuary has two week-long programs for kids this summer! Yoga Monkey Kids (ages 6–10) weaves yoga and creative movement, mythic storytelling, creative crafts, and games into one fun and enchanting week! Play Practice: Exploring Yoga & Theater (ages 10–13) includes yoga techniques, theater games, and creative exercises designed to unleash each student’s unique expression, as well as foster dynamic group creation. Plus, all the summer fun of daily outdoors time and a special day spent walking and swimming in our beautiful local nature! Both programs include a special sharing for parents on the final day. A discounted two-week price is available for participants ages 10 (or even 11!)! Yoga Monkey Kids: June 25–29, 9–2 pm. Play Practice: August 1–5, 9–2 pm. www.yoga-sanctuary.com/kids-summer-programs; studio@yoga-sanctuary.com

The Hilltown Youth Summer Workshop in Charlemont, MA, offers intensive outdoor training for aspiring actors, artists, dancers, musicians, singers, and circus performers (trapeze, fabrics, stilts, German wheel) with Andrae Green, Scott Halligan, Laura Iveson, Double Edge Theatre, and other luminaries from the Valley’s performing arts community. Perform under the stars on an aerial park, zipline, mountaintop at Berkshire East, ensemble and theatergoers reach by chairlift! Help create their 2022 spectacle “Much Ado About Nothing” guest directed by Knighthorse Theatre—”our mission is to make Shakespeare cool again”—no prior experience required. HS-aged participants can apply for their YouthCore program.
Dates: July 11-August 4, 2022; Age Range: 10-18yo. Contact: 413-625-2100 ♦ hilltownyouth@gmail.com ♦ hilltownyouth.org

Performing Arts Camp at Stoneleigh-Burnham School (SBS) in Greenfield is a camp for ages 10-16 interested in theater, voice, and dance! Performing arts is a great way for students to investigate the world around them and cultivate meaning in their lives. At SBS, performing arts classes are community-oriented, nonhierarchical, body-positive, and culturally relevant. Students will spend time learning and rehearsing a fun program of choral music, musical theater, and dance through participation in the performing arts camp. Students will have the opportunity to learn about vocal technique and health, work on acting and emoting, and focus on dance for musical theater. At the end of the week, students will share their learnings in an informal performance. Dates: August 7-13, 2022; Age Range: 10-16yo. Contact: 413-774-2711 ♦ sbschool.org

List of Weekly Suggested Events

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Self-Directed Learning: Plant Sales & Swaps

Plant sales & swaps happen all over western Massachusetts this time of year. From big to small events, many raising funds for valuable community resources, plant sales are an excellent opportunity for sourcing your plants (and gardening knowledge) locally. They are terrific community events for learning tips on plants and gardening from home gardeners and experts in the field! Bring your family to a plant sale this spring and unearth the embedded learning they hold for the entire family! Read more in our post, Plant Sales & Swap Support Local Causes & Embedded Learning.

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Self-Directed Learning: National Astronomy Day

A community-based educational resource available to everyone is the sun! To keep time using the sun, we sometimes check the sky to see its position – but this method isn’t very accurate. Shadows, on the other hand, can give a more precise reading of the time, but only if the right tools are used! Families can create their own sundials using simple materials found around the house, allowing shadows to become their new clock. Beginning at noon on a sunny day, this project requires monitoring on the hour, every hour during the daylight portion of a 24-hour-period. The results are a nature-based time-telling device that can spark explorations of geometry, the structure of time, and ancient history. Making your own sundial can also support the scientific understandings of the earth’s relationship with the sun, and when done with young children, the development and practice of language skills.

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Self-Directed Learning: Agriculture/Asparagus

In the Connecticut River Valley, late spring is always associated with harvesting asparagus or ‘Hadley Grass.’ Hadley, once known as the ‘Asparagus Capital of the World,’ was famous for its asparagus from the 1930s to the 1970s. In May and June, the whole Hadley community would come together and harvest up to 50 tons of asparagus a day by hand. While Hadley and the surrounding towns once had several hundred small asparagus farms, in the mid-1970s, a fungus called Fusarium was introduced to the area and decimated the asparagus industry. Local asparagus production may only be a tenth of what it once was, but the asparagus harvest is still an important cultural event for many in the region. Many of our local towns honor the asparagus harvest as a traditional part of spring through food celebrations and community meals, marking the season and connecting us to where we live through food traditions.

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Self-Directed Learning: Kitchen Chemistry

People often talk about “chemicals” in our food, water, or hygiene products in reference to possibly toxic or carcinogenic ingredients. Some chemicals certainly are dangerous to humans, but EVERYTHING is made up of chemicals! But what is the exact definition of a chemical, anyway? The Merriam-Webster definition of “chemical” reads, “A substance obtained by a chemical process or producing a chemical effect.” Chemistry is the study of how chemicals interact and react with one another. Cooking is often used as an example of an everyday activity that involves chemistry. When you apply heat to a piece of steak in a pan, water content leaves the muscle fibers. This is why the filet is smaller after it has been cooked. Think about some other interesting reactions which occur in the kitchen. Why does corn pop? Corn contains water, which turns to steam, creating pressure inside the hard outer shell and eventually exploding. Another way to ask this question would be, why don’t other grains pop? Learn more about these types of reactions and get curious in the kitchen!

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Self-Directed Learning: Bobolink Migration

The bird populations in Western Massachusetts have inspired many poets and writers to pick up their pens and compose verses dedicated to our feathered friends, celebrating nature and the land. Cummington native William Cullen Bryant, and Amherst native Emily Dickinson, both wrote poems about the bobolink. This intriguing species migrates back to New England in the late Spring (mid-late May) where it prefers large grasslands, such as hay fields, where they can build their nests on the ground. They are impressive birds, with a curious and clownish fluttering that is a joy to see in the late spring and early summer. Due to their preference to nest in hay fields often utilized by farmers, The Bobolink Project seeks to work with farmers to delay haying fields in order to protect grassland birds such as bobolinks. Learn about bobolinks through the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s website and their educational videos on different bird species. After learning about their habitat, migration patterns, behavior and nesting preferences, read Bryant’s poem Robert of Lincoln and Emily Dickinson’s poem. The Way to know the Bobolink for examples of how language art can describe the nature and habitat of the bobolink in beautiful and complex ways.

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Self-Directed Learning: Botany/Flowers

Did you know that a dandelion flower is many flowers that make up a single head? Getting curious and paying attention to flowers that pop up during the spring and summer can help us become more mindful of the seasons, weather conditions, and plant species. Our front lawns, local meadows, and even cracks in the sidewalks can be a great place to start simple lessons in botany! Keeping a journal to document observations, either in words, sketches, or photographs, can support awareness of seasonal patterns and how sunlight, insects, weather, and soil conditions can impact plants. In the spring, one flowering plant which can quickly spark curiosity and begin simple lessons in botany is the common dandelion. Easy to identify and loaded with teachings in not only botany, but also the culinary arts, history, and STEM, the dandelion is perfect for learning about a plant life cycle, the parts of the flower, and the processes of pollination and seed distribution. Getting curious about the structure and function of the dandelion and exploring the entire plant from blossom to stem to taproot is a great place to begin. Compare and contrast a dissection of the dandelion flower with other plants that are flowering at the same time (i.e., daffodil, azalea, wild violets). Notice the differences in form, color, and patterns. Compare the levels of sunlight (full, partial, or shade) in which these different plant species grow, which insects are essential to their pollination and research to learn if they are an annual or perennial plant. In this video, learn how to conduct a flower dissection and how to organize an exploration of flowering parts and functions.

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Self-Directed Learning: Nutritional Anthropology: Cuban Food

Cuba gained formal independence from the U.S. on May 20, 1902, as the Republic of Cuba. Culture is the product of different communities interacting with and influencing each other. Nowhere is this truth more visible than in food. To even trace the source of various elements in a single dish requires the work of a historian. From ingredients, to spices, to cooking techniques, to flavor profiles, all food is the end product of hundreds and thousands of years worth of cultural movement and change. And of course, there is no cuisine that has finished growing and shifting and changing over time. Cuban food is no exception. As the Caribbean has been a melting pot of indigenous, European, African, Asian, and Central and South American cultures for hundreds of years, the food scene in Cuba is extremely dynamic and reflects a vast array of influences. Cuba has gone through an enormous amount of change in the last century and all of those changes are reflected in its culinary culture. The  film “Cuban Food Stories” explores the rich food traditions of this island, by the producer of the popular film “Jiro Dreams of Sushi.” This film is a great opportunity to learn about how food can teach us about society and history. 

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Weekly eNewsletter

Online and in-person events and resources shared above are done so as a courtesy and not as an endorsement. While we do our best to share accurate and up-to-date information, please take the time to confirm information, age appropriateness, registration requirements, safety protocols, and associated costs.

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Hilltown Families’ list of Suggested Events is supported in part by grants from the Agawam, Amherst, Becket, Bernardston, Buckland, Chester, Chicopee, Colrain, Cummington, Easthampton, Goshen, Granby, Greenfield, Hadley, Hatfield, Heath, Hinsdale/Peru, Huntington, Leyden, Montgomery, Mount Washington, Northern Berkshire, Orange, Otis, Palmer, Pelham, Rowe, Shelburne, Shutesbury, South Hadley, Tolland, Tyringham, Westhampton, Windsor, and Worthington Cultural Councils, local agencies which are supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.