MOLLI: Grandparents & Grandkids

“Connecting the Circle” Science Day Camp

Click here for more information about summer camp 2009.

Click here to view ALL of the summer camp pictures.  The passwords is summer2009.

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July 20 at 9:00 am the fun began with “Magic of Chemistry” by UM Professor Garon Smith.

Magic of Chemistry

G. Wiz  A.K.A Garon Smith

9:00 am, Skaggs Theatre-UM

Garon Smith came to UM in 1991 from State University of New York College at Fredonia. He received his Ph.D. degree in 1983 from the Colorado School of Mines and taught at Colorado College before moving to Fredonia. Garon Smith is an analytical/environmental chemist with broad interests in air and water characterization. He teaches freshman chemistry and undergraduate and graduate courses in analytical and environmental chemistry.

Participants then moved on to their selected camp sessions.

Camp options:

•  “Fun with Stars” with UM lecturer Diane Friend;

•  “To Be a Paleontologist” with UM Professor George Stanley;

•  “interActions: The World of Puppets and Robots” with community educator Margaret Johnson;

•  “Buzz about Bees” with UM Professor Jerry Bromenshenk.

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Fun with Stars

Diane Friend, UM lecturer

Looking up at a dark night sky, have you ever wondered what is “out there”? This class will give you a chance to explore our own corner of the cosmos! We will look at the Sun through a solar telescope, use the Blue Mountain Observatory to explore stars, nebulas, and distant galaxies, and learn how to use star charts, the web, and computer software to discover what you can observe at anytime, from anywhere. For a little something to take home, we will end the class with an opportunity to take some digital astrophotos of some of your favorite celestial objects.

To Be a Paleontologist

George Stanley, UM Professor

This two day course will enrich both young and old minds with the knowledge of things and times past. With one day of classroom learning and one day of hands on field experience, kids and grandparents alike will learn and discover new facts about old specimens! The second day will require some walking, kneeling, and uneven ground, but the adventure is worth it! For more information about George Stanley click here.

interActions: the World of Puppets and Robots

Margaret Johnson, Community Educator

We all have an innate impulse to mime and play - so let's become robots and puppets. Learning the pantomime techniques needed to develop these inanimate objects, as well as their manipulators, uses our muscles, illusion, and energy, involving the science of biology as well as several of our senses. By creating these “machines” with interrelated parts, we will demonstrate knowledge of movement, gesture, and emotion as well as an understanding of our muscular system. A final presentation at Hellgate Theatre will be videotaped in front of invited guests. A DVD from that performance will be given to all participants.

Margaret Johnson: After teaching theatre at Sentinel High School for thirty-seven years and directing over 190 productions, Margaret has kept busy acting with the Missoula Community Theater.  In '07 her book The Drama Teacher's Survival Guide was published.  In '08 she added teaching for the MOLLI program to her retirement activities and blogging with her publisher, Contemporary Drama, sharing her experiences in the theater classroom and her latest adventures in community theatre.  You may have seen her recently as Old Sally in Oliver.

For more information about Margaret Johnson click here.

Buzz about Bees

Jerry Bromenshenk, UM Professor

Discover the Buzz about bees in this interactive learning experience. This course will provide classroom and field lessons in bee biology and beekeeping.  Classroom acivities will cover the origins of honey bees, an overview of basic bee biology, and how bees produce honey and wax and their essential role as pollinators of more than 1/3 of what we eat.

A five story, glass obvservation hive will allow everyone to examine the inner workings of a bee colony in their hive.  A short walking tour to the UC gardens will help demonstrate how bees gather nectar and pollen, how to tell pollen gatherers from nectar gatherers, and the types of plants that bees visit and pollinate.

Field trips will include a visit to a bee yard and hands on experience building a beehive and extracting honey.  Hopefully, by the end of the course, some of the grandparents may decide to set up a beehive with their grandchildren.  The course will provide sufficient information for them to take up beekeeping as a hobby, for learning and profit.  Hopefully, some of the grandchildren may become tomorrow's beekeepers.

Jerry Bromenshenk graduated with a Ph.D. in entomology from Montana State University, Bozeman in 1973.  He has more than 35 years of experience working with honey bees.  Jerry is a member of the National Working Group on Colony Collapse Disease as well as Founder of Bee Alert Technology, Inc. He works closely with beekeepers in Montana, across the U.S., and around the world.  Jerry is Co-inventor of systems for training bees to locate drug labs, dead bodies, and land mines.

For more information about Jerry Bromenshenk Click here .

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MOLLI: Grandparents & Grandkids “Connecting the Circle” Science Day Camp has been sponsored in part by

Montana National Science Fund EPSCoR.  To learn more about this grant program click here.

In conjunction with Montana NSF EPSCoR we are working with SpectrUM. 

The SpectrUM Discovery Area is a new, interactive science center, located in the Skaggs Building onthe UM campus,

committed to inspiring a culture of learning and discovery for all. To learn more about SpectrUM click here.

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