Camp Invention help kids learn about science, space

A four-day science camp held at Wingate Elementary School this week is encouraging local youth to get interested in science by taking them through space exploration and other STEM-based curriculum.

Students were even able to observe a meteorite Wednesday morning.

“For as little as it is, it’s pretty heavy, but it’s kind of cool,” student Catherine Reed said.

The soon-to-be Bellefonte Area Middle School student was among 25 others from Centre and Clinton counties who participated in Camp Invention, a program through the National Inventors Hall of Fame that aims to engage kindergarten through sixth-grade students.

The program also helps fund schools that host the camp, assisting with program fees for families in need and offsetting some other costs.

Tracy Boone, Bald Eagle Area School District director of curriculum and instruction, said the program, in its third year at BEA, helps stimulate kids’ minds when school is out of session.

“It’s creative and innovative, and forces them to think about why something works and how it works the way it does,” she said.

BEA teacher Jennifer Gilbert facilitated a lesson on space Wednesday morning that put a group of students in a faux outer space experience.

She said students were required to use telescopes to identify planets. The students then had to choose a planet to make inhabitable.

To get there, the students also created and launched rockets. Once on their planets, they were encouraged to team up in groups to test soil, hatch eggs that produced imitation reptiles, and even grow their own plants, which included a dinosaur plant that grows when placed in water with lava rocks.

“It’s important to make sure they have everything needed to make it livable — animals that eat plants that produce oxygen and so on,” Gilbert said.

Curriculum provided by program administrators also included lessons in chemistry, life science, technology, art and entrepreneurship.

This story was originally published July 12, 2017 at 5:31 PM with the headline "Camp Invention help kids learn about science, space."