I’ve spent this past week volunteering for GeneSkool as a group leader. It feels great to be back in a classroom with actual “kids”. for their safety, I haven’t posted any photos of the students, and won’t use their real names here. The four students who made up my team were great. My time this week reminded me of how excited I am to become a teacher at the end of this year (2023).
The GeneSkool program is well organized and brings an impressive array of 2nd- 4th year biochemistry lab experiments to an accessible level for any teenagers to engage. Most importantly, IT WAS FUN! The whole camp is themed around a murder mystery. The students play a group of intrepid crime scene investigators, who are tasked with finding out who the killer was, and how the murder was actually committed.
My big take aways this week are as follows;
- These students ranged from 12 to 16 years of age and they were more than capable of following any of the technical jargon that they were exposed to. The important caveate to note, is that you had to explain the jargon the first time. Many students understood how a DNA gel is possible, but only after you explained the negatively charged nature of DNA in the first place.
- Learning can be fun! all of the acivities were hands on, but it was the central theme that tied it all together “who dun it?!”. This running narrative really drove engagement for all of the students who maintained focus.
- We had an hour lunch every day. For adults, that’s a good thing. For students it seemed a little long. I brought board games with me to play with whom ever wanted. I figured my team would be tired of me, but the board game lunches were a great time for us to get our minds of the case and just hang out. I will definitely make boardgames a stapple in my room for anyone at lunch.
