Gifted and Talented students begin immersive learning trip

While a trip to coastal California sounds like fun and games on the surface of it, the eight Custer County Schools students trav­elling there this week with Shelley Green, their Gifted and Talented Instructor, know it is anything but that. Fun, yes, but the games’ part is instead, an itinerary of intense, immer­sive learning experiences. These range from participation in the Santa Barbara Mission Street Festival to UC Santa Barbara marine biology labs to the large animal veterinarian offices at the San Diego Zoo.

Those environments are only a small part of the extensively planned interdisciplinary learning adventure. Green reports that the gifted and talented students participating in this academic exploration have collaborated in the design and implementation of the five-day trip. What she refers to as “experiential learning together” is the culmination of dreams, passions, and student professional and academic interests over the two years that the gifted and talented program has gotten back on its feet at the school.

Green also expresses immense gratitude for parental support—two parents are also accompanying the students and their instruc­tor—and for the trip’s financial donors: Rebecca’s Fund, Education Legacy Fund, and High Mountain Hay Fever Bluegrass Festival Health Fund. “Without this commu­nity support, the trip would not be possible.”

The trip logistics have been challeng­ing, and the challenges have been met. A 14-person rental van awaits them upon arrival on their Colorado Springs flight at Santa Barbara airport. The learning envi­ronment includes the van, as it will pro­vide a seminar-like space for immediately debriefing the last experience on the way to the next. The same is so for their housing accommodation, a beach house with rather crowded sleeping spaces. Nonetheless, the tight quarters, with access to the beach for relaxing breaks, as well as meal preparation, provide opportunities for processing student learning on the spot.

Perhaps the most unique feature of the trip is the fact that most of these students have known, played, and studied with each other since kindergarten. They know and interact with familiarity with each other’s passions, academic interests, intellectual curiosity, and areas of uncertainty. For example, when the whole group is hosted by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Caltech in pursuit of Creed Ingram’s com­mitment to higher education and employ­ment in aerospace engineering, all of the students function as a support team. So it will be with all the array of learning envi­ronments to be visited.

Even their visit to Disneyland is as learn­ing-oriented as their time at LA’s Natural History Museum or the California Science Center—it is being construed by the learn­ing team as a “celebration of childhood.”

We wish them well and await the ful­some reports from these inspiring students upon their return.

By the way, if readers have not tuned in to Gary Taylor’s Valley Views interview two weeks ago with Green and four of the eight students, it is available for listening at KLZR’s website archived segments.

– W.A. Ewing