By second grade, children are supposed to be able to describe and recall their typical daily route to school and back home.
Harding University Partnership School second-grade students tried their hand at the assignment Friday, mapping out the ocean and mountains of Santa Barbara in relation to their current destination — the Davidson Library at UC Santa Barbara.
They looked at computer maps and sketched their own on paper, enthralled with the task enough to ask questions and help fellow classmates with their geography.
It was the first year the Santa Barbara students took on mapping, but Friday marked the sixth year Harding School has visited with its educational counterpart, UCSB’s Gevirtz Graduate School of Education.
About 400 school children descended on UCSB’s campus for the four-hour morning visit, where Harding and university staff alike hoped to instill a love — or at least a curiosity — in higher education.
As a partnership school, Gevirtz Graduate School sends student teachers and faculty researchers to observe at Harding, which in turn visits and learns at a real university.
Kindergartners focused on aerobic dance and exercise, first graders tried creative writing, fourth graders learned about nonverbal communication, fifth graders received a nature lesson and sixth graders took a walk to the Marine Lab and Campus Point Beach.
The third-grade students were with Susan Johnson, a Gevirtz School lecturer who led a session detailing how magic can be explained by science.
Johnson talked about solids, liquids and gases and what particles look like in each state of matter.
“A gas is something you can’t see,” one student said. She eagerly raised her hand along with most of her curious classmates.
“This is a smart group,” Johnson said. “We love questions.”
Johnson asked them to use a clothing hanger with strings attached to it to detect whether particles in the classroom were made with metal, and students happily obeyed.
The UCSB visit is something Harding students look forward to every year, said Principal Veronica Binkley, who noted most of the children would be the first in their families to attend college.
“I so appreciate the amount of work UCSB puts forth every year,” she said.
Suzanne Oliver, who plans the UCSB visit as director of community relations at Gevirtz Graduate School of Education, said the event is an campus-wide effort.
“There’s a larger importance,” Oliver said, counting the day among the regular outreach UCSB does throughout Santa Barbara County. “They’re coming back as our freshmen.”
— Noozhawk staff writer Gina Potthoff can be reached at gpotthoff@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.