Courses for 2008.

Around the World in Ten Days

1 hour/day; Instructor: Marianne Clausing-Lee, Additional $8 fee per student for international foods
Explore customs, cultures, geography, food, and languages experienced by the instructor in her travels throughout the world. The first day of class, students will select from a list the countries they want to investigate. Possible destinations include East Africa, South Africa, Egypt, Greece, Turkey, Morocco, Hong Kong, China, Vietnam, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, South Pacific Islands, Caribbean, Europe, South America (including the Galapagos Islands and Easter Island). Videos are used to show some of the countries' geography. Some sampling of foods will be included.

 

Astronomy

1 hour/day; Instructor: Morgan Emerson
Discover, understand and explore modern astronomy and cosmology. Learn about methods and basic physical principles astronomers use to understand and observe the universe. Use telescopes and “ancient” navigation tools. Work with digital cameras to learn how astronomers take pictures of objects in space. Use the computer program “Starry Night” to look at the solar system and galaxy from different views.  Interesting and fun for all levels; come explore the universe with us!

 

Basic Computer Science and Programming

2 hours/day; Instructor: Gibby Reynolds
In this introduction to computer science, explore basic elements of computer architecture, programming concepts, and modern day applications of computer systems.  Learn how to create simple programs in the BASIC programming language.  Rudimentary typing skills are helpful; no prior computer programming experience required.

 

 

Become a Health Hazard Detective!

1 hour/day; Instructor: Sandra Uesugi
If you love science, math and medical mysteries, this is the course for you! The Sanchez family has been struck by a mysterious illness.  Even the dog is sick!  Become a health hazard detective like the forensic investigators of CSI and help the Sanchez family figure out what is going on.  As part of your investigation, interview the family, collect soil, water, and dust samples, analyze data, and visit science laboratories.  After determining what is making the Sanchez family ill, make recommendations to remedy their problem.

 

Bridge Building

1 hour/day; Instructor: Jonathan Oelkers; Additional $5 fee per student for materials
Explore bridge design!  Construct bridges!  Stress structures!  Break bridges!  Learn about different designs that are used by engineers to maximize the strength of a bridge.    During this hands-on experience you will build bridges out of ordinary materials, such as straws and popsicle sticks, and then put them to the test.  You'll be filled with amazement as you test your final bridge under hundreds of pounds of weight.  Will it hold, or snap under pressure?

 

Chemistry Is Cool

1 hour/day; Instructor: Jonathan Oelkers; Additional $10 fee per student for materials
Make ice cream! Test cannons! Instantly freeze random objects! Blow stuff up! You'll do this and much more as you explore the world of chemistry. In a fun, hands-on way, experiment with things like liquid nitrogen, dry ice, acids and bases, and explosive reactions as you discover how chemistry relates to everyday life.

Chess for All 

1 hour/day; Instructor: Stacy Mitchell Vaughn
Whether you are a beginner or an advanced player, sign up for chess to learn strategy, tournament play, and a variety of chess-related games.  Learn the rules, fine tune your skills, but most of all, enjoy playing one of the world's oldest games.

 

Claybonga - Clay art that rocks!

1 hour/day; Instructor: Kathy Jederlinich; Additional $10 fee per student for materials
You will be the first class to use a new and exciting self-hardening, non-toxic modeling clay that is not yet on the market! You can paint it when it’s dry, or add color with powdered tempera before you mold it. There are many ways to use this clay. Learn relief sculpture, hand sculpture, and carving. Make animal or human or mythological forms. You be the creator!

 

Contemplate and Calibrate a Catapult

1 hour/day; Instructor: Marcus Beck
Learn the engineering principles behind catapults. Use the provided catapult(s) to throw a golf ball up to 100 feet.  Working in teams of two or three, students will learn to accurately calibrate each catapult and install an aiming device.  Use triangulation to determine the exact distance to a given target, take aim, and let it go!

 

Creative Writing

1 hour/day; Instructor: Marin Langner
Explore your creative side through poetry and short fiction. Learn how to write a variety of poetic forms, tell an exciting story, and explore your personal writing style.  Create a portfolio of original poems and short stories inspired by experiences, sounds and art work. Each student will publish his or her own original collection of writing in a bound souvenir book.

 

Debate: the Power of Expression

1 hour/day; Instructor: Danielle Robertson
How many times a day do you argue?  Who do you argue with - teachers, parents, friends? Argument and debate makes our government work; our opinions shape the way the U.S. is run. Learn what it takes to really argue.  You will listen to, speak in front of, and cooperate with peers to create opinions and express them. Our subjects will be current events in our own community, state, nation, and world. Bring your opinions and ideas about the world to class, and learn to build solid arguments and deliver them effectively!

 

Discovering Antibacterial Compounds From Plants

1 hour/day; Instructors: Linda Bruslind & Karen Dierksen
Have you ever dreamed of being a medicine man or medicine woman in the Amazon jungle, or discovering the "cure" for cancer? Here's an opportunity for students with a passion for science and discovery to examine local and exotic plants for compounds that inhibit or kill pathogenic bacteria.  Using an OSU microbiology lab and equipment, perform methods for distinguishing classes of bacteria, utilize procedures for extraction of water and/or alcohol soluble extracts from plants, and then test your extracts for antibacterial activity against certain classes of bacteria.  Develop safe laboratory skills while working as part of a team.

 

Drawing Creatively

1 hour/day; Instructor: Lorraine Dauw
Drawing Creatively is for students who love to draw and want to improve their skills. Explore different drawing techniques and learn to incorporate and bring together a variety of images into a single work drawn from life and the imagination. Emphasis will be placed on the development of each student’s artistic expression, style and creativity while working toward completed drawings. All skill levels are welcome.

 

Electricity and Magnetism

1 hour/day; Instructor: KC Walsh
Explore the physics behind electricity and magnetism through lab based activities.  Our world is governed by the laws of physics and few topics are as interesting as electricity and magnetism.  Discover how a minuscule particle like an electron can make it's mark on the world at the grandest of levels.  Explore the origins of magnetism and it's ability to act on objects from a distance.  Find out what happens to regular magnet when it is frozen to -321 degrees Fahrenheit.  These phenomena and more will be discovered, explored, and hopefully, explained!

Forensics >

1 hour/day; Instructor: Jonathan Oelkers ; Additional $8 fee per student for materials
A crime is committed.  Explore the crime scene, collect the evidence, analyze the data, and crack the case.  As a junior detective plan to find clues, analyze evidence using awesome forensics techniques, and maybe even crack the case.  This hands-on adventure will be the forensics experience of a lifetime.

 

France and the French

1 hour/day; Instructor: Marianne Clausing-Lee; Additional $8 fee per student for French foods.
An introduction to France, the French language, and the best of French culture. Practice beginning French language patterns, intonations, inflections, and accents. Sample some French foods and learn basic conversational French phrases for international travel in France, Africa, and French Polynesia.

 

Funky Art for Outdoors

1 hour/day; Instructor: Kathy Jederlinich
Do you like to drill, sand, and hammer? Make garden sculptures with recycled parts. Explore the possibilities of using scrap wood, metal, plastic, and even moving parts to make weather resistant art for your garden, and maybe a relief sculpture as well to hang on a wall. You get to hammer, drill, sand, and paint. Make it fun, funky, and bright using recycled latex house paint!

Hands on, Feet in, Wetlands! >

1 hour/day; Instructor: Gail O'Malley

Do you like exploring environments that can be muddy, sometimes smelly, with microscopic creatures alongside beautiful, even rare plants?  If so, exploring wetlands is for you.  We will be examining up close factors of soil, plants and aquatics that make up the unique wetland environment. Use microscopes in the lab, and use technical equipment in the field to survey the characteristics which make up this important ecosystem.
Note: This class will need parent drivers one day each week to/from a local wetlands, no more than 6 miles from OSU.

 

LEGO® Robotics

2 hours/day; Instructors: Kyle Levien & Graham Jones
Whether you have played with LEGO® sets all your life, or never built a thing, you will love LEGO® Robotics.  Combine and improve your skills of building, creative problem solving, and engineering while programming your LEGO® robot to do just about anything.  You will be amazed the first time you watch your programming spring to life as your robot turns in a circle, solves a maze, or uses a light sensor to follow a colored path.  No previous experience required -- only an enthusiasm for learning and enjoyment of hands-on experiences.

 

Lights! Camera! Action!

1 hour/day; Instructor: Michael Todd Backus; Each student supplies one DVD.

 Additional fee of $15 per student to cover equipment & production costs
Don’t just watch TV, make it! Learn technical skills and how to express your artistic creativity in this hands-on video course. Work with video production equipment in 4 person teams to produce a television show. Students will learn and apply elements of framing, camera work, green screen and storyboarding. Each member of the AIL TV production crew receives a videotaped copy of the show.

 

Math Pentathlon Games--Advanced

1 hour/day; Instructor: Stacey Mitchell Vaughn
Play the more advanced challenging math games which integrate active problem solving and mathematical reasoning. The second week participants test their gaming skills in a tournament. If you enjoy games that keep you and your friends on your toes, you just may be a math pentathlete!

 

On the Air at KBVR-FM

1 hour/day; Instructors: KBVR-FM staff; Each student student supplies a CD R.
Produce your own live on-air radio show at OSU's radio station, KBVR-FM 88.7. Be trained in the art of radio broadcasting. Learn all aspects of live broadcasting as well as pre-recorded production. Announce the news, PSA's and play music on the air. Take home pieces of your own shows on CD. You'll be the envy of all your friends. (Ok, maybe not, but at least you can say you had fun.)

 

Physics Challenge

1 hour/day; Instructor: KC Walsh
Are you interested in taming the laws of physics to solve complex problems? This course for those who think they have what it takes to save a helpless egg survive it's fall from space (actually, the top of a building!).  Get ready to solve this and other physics challenges!

 

Rockin' Rockets

1 hour/day;  Instructor: Jeff Gunn; Additional $12 fee per student for materials
Explore the physics of flight as you construct and launch Estes rockets. Specific concepts include Newton's Laws of motion and forces affecting flight. Most of our rockets will be traveling to heights exceeding 1000 feet!

 

Simulated Archaeological Dig

2 hours/day; Instructor: Carol Boaz

Create your own civilization and learn how archaeologists do their work. Work with a team to create a unique and top-secret culture, complete with the artifacts representing rituals, government, and language. Imagine excavating strange artifacts, and using your powers of deduction to discover the secrets of a lost civilization. Each team will present their findings at the Official Archaeological Convention of the International Society of Intrepid Archaeologists, with hilarious results. This is an intense 20-hour course-each student must work cooperatively and creatively produce results in a given time frame.

 

Team Challenge

1 hour/day; Instructor: Aileen Hood
A hot lake of cocoa? A helium stick? New and supportive friends? Want some extra challenges? Who can you trust? Your teammates? Can they trust you? Eah day is different. Wear closed-toed shoes and comfortable outdoor clothes. This just might be your most favorite class ever!

The Play's the Thing  >

2 hours/day; Instructors: Majestic Theatre Education Staff
Come one, come all!  This class is a fun way to learn more about the art of design and acting for the stage and theatre. Design, rehearse and perform a short play.  The production will be complete with costumes and properties.

 

Water Bottle Rocketry

1 hour/day; Instructor: Marcus Beck
Investigate rocket science and discover the physical forces that enable rockets to fly.  Design, build and launch 2-liter water rockets (with scrupulous attention to safety).  Use analysis and data comparison to redesign and re-launch your vehicles to improve payload efficiency and accuracy.  No previous rocket experience required. Hydrophobes beware- students may get wet!

 

Web Site Design for Beginners

1 hour/day;  Instructor: TBD
Tell your friends and family about yourself or your favorite hobby with a Web page or two built by YOU! This method of communicating could even be the answer to your future school projects! Create Web pages that link you to the world, create graphics files, choose Web-ready colors, add links from other sites, and tie it all together with HTML, the language of the World Wide Web. Bring an action photo of yourself or your hobby.

 

Web Site Design: Advanced

1 hour/day;  Instructor: TBD

For those who think they have basic web design mastered, this is the class for you.

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