KAYSVILLE -- The challenge: Get the marble to roll around a 4-foot peg board and land in a bucket without it dropping to the floor.
A group of students who are enrolled in Davis School District's Utah Science Technology and Research program spent Thursday engaged in problem solving, building ramps, and learning about cells, microscopes, energy and molecules.
The Leonardo, a nonprofit organization based in Salt Lake City, came to Davis High School to give the summer school students a chance to do hands-on activities that involved math and science.
Mario Magana and Ian Martin, both junior high school students, used masking tape, aluminum foil and wooden dowels to build a ramp that wrapped from one side of the peg board to the other side where the bucket sat on the ground.
Even though the boys are in different grades and will attend different schools this fall, they are taking a summer geometry class in order to get ahead.
But first the problem was to get that marble to land in the bucket without it touching the floor.
"I think we need to put this here," Mario said as he put a dowel at the top of the bucket as a barrier.
In a nearby classroom, other students were discovering how infrared lights are used every day.
A Wii remote controller was programmed so a computer picked up its infrared light, which measured movements made by students who held the controller.
"Even if you say you don't like science or math, this stuff incorporates it," said Kay Denton, the Workforce Innovations in Regional Economic Development educator facilitator with The Leonardo.
"I did not know how much we use infrared (lights)" said Claire Ashton, who will be a senior at Viewmont High School this August.
Heather Chamberlain, one of the USTAR teachers at Davis High School, said having The Leonardo at the school gives students an opportunity to see in action what they are studying seven hours a day for seven weeks.
The Leonardo program has been to 30 schools this year. It plans to open in a permanent location in the Salt Lake City Public Library on April 15, 2011, on Leonardo da Vinci's birthday, Denton said.
The Leonardo is a science, technology and art center that will give students of all ages opportunities to learn more about the world around them, she said.
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