Kids let minds take flight

The 7-year-old boy looked over the computer circuit board in his hands and contemplated its uses.

Owen Cunningham hoped to use it to build a surveillance system to keep an eye on his “one most pestering brother,” he said. “It will be a computer with a monitor hooked to a treadmill with a camera on the stairs.”

The Cataldo Catholic School student came up with the idea at Camp Invention while learning about chain reactions. The weeklong program teaches science, technology, engineering and mathematics in a playful, hands-on environment.

“It’s all about controlled chaos and inventing,” said Karrie Brown, director of the local program. “It’s so much fun.”

The program is designed for children entering first through sixth grades. Kids will be learning the science behind superheroes, developing a water balloon launcher and designing safety devices for vehicles, among other lessons.

Camp Invention, created in 1990 by the National Inventors Hall of Fame Foundation, is held in 1,065 locations nationally, said Raven DeVoll, a Camp Invention spokeswoman.

Sixty kids are enrolled in the program at Moran Prairie Elementary School through today.

It was 10-year-old Ryan Moore’s third year at camp. “This is my best year,” he said.

On Thursday afternoon, he was in the Viking treasure section, which included a segment on learning what floats in water.

“One group made a boat out of cardboard,” Moore said. “It didn’t work well, because it soaked up the water.”

The superheroes section included lessons on reactions, speed, thrust and gravity. The lesson that stuck most in Linnea Sunderman’s mind was gravity, she said. And the soon-to-be first-grader’s father helped reinforce the lesson.

“Papa showed me a cool experiment by putting water in a bucket, tying a rope on and spinning it over his head,” she said.

Sophia Waldenberg, 10, said the camp “is sort of like summer school, but you get to throw water balloons at each other.”