Workshop Trains Educators on Youth Science Project

The North Dakota State University Extension Service is holding a two-day workshop to train teachers, county Extension staff and volunteers to help youth unlock Antarctica’s climate secrets.

The workshop is set for June 4-5 at the Cass County Annex, 1010 2nd Ave. S., Fargo. It will run from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days.

Participants will learn about “Antarctica’s Climate Secrets,” an informal science education project for 10- to 15-year-olds. The project is designed for youth in the classroom, after-school programs or camps.

The National Science Foundation’s International Polar Year program is partially funding the program to increase the public’s understanding of ANDRILL, the multinational, National Science Foundation-funded Antarctic Drilling Project.

ANDRILL is a research project that involves recovering sedimentary rock cores from beneath Antarctica’s ice to learn the continent’s climate history. Researchers are hoping that looking at the past will help them predict what will happen on this warming planet.

What workshop participants take home will allow them to help youth learn about Antarctica’s climate and then host a public science event called a Flexhibit. The kids will build and interact with models and learn to demonstrate science activities. They’ll do the teaching or prepare interpretive materials to display at their exhibit.

The Flexhibit covers five themes: Antarctica today, Antarctica’s ice on the move, reading Antarctica’s rock cores, tiny clues to Antarctica’s past and decoding Antarctica’s climate history. Each theme has three to five hands-on activities, five museum-quality banners and 15 one- to two-minute video clips.

Each workshop participant will receive a kit with all of the supplies the youth need for the project’s activities, as well as a set of banners and an activity/resource book. Participants also must sign a contract to:

• Work with youth to complete the learning activities
• Help youth plan and host a Flexhibit
• Complete a pre- and post-evaluation of the program with the youth
• Submit a one-page final report by Aug. 31, 2009

Enrollment in the workshop is limited to 24 participants. The cost is $100 for the first 12 to enroll. The fee is $825 for each additional participant. The registration deadline is May 16.

Participants also may complete the workshop for 1 NDSU graduate credit. The fee for that will be an additional $60.

NDSU 4-H youth development specialist Linda Hauge and Cass County Extension agent Maxine Nordick will be the workshop facilitators. LuAnn Dahlman, curriculum developer and Antarctic research associate with the Technical Education Research Center in Cambridge, Mass., and Stacey Hofmann, 4-H youth development educator with Maryland Cooperative Extension, will be the guest lecturers.

For more information, contact Hauge at (701) 231-7964 or linda.hauge@ndsu.edu. A brochure and registration form are available online at http://www.ext.nodak.edu/4h/4-h.htm.

NDSU Agriculture Communication