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Has anyone attended any of the John's Hopkin's weekend classes? I just got the brochure for the Creative Connections Series Grades 2-4, the Discovery Series for grade 5-7, etc. HOnestly, my 4th grader is ready for the Discovery Series based on the descriptions in the brochure. I'd like to talk to someone who's attended one of these to see what they thought of them. I wonder if they are strict regarding the age requirements? I had expected since these are programs for the very brightest kids, the programs would reflect that.

FOr ex: for the one grade 2-4 series in my area, it's a museum visit to an aquarium with some behind the scenes stuff. Whereas for the grade 5-7, it's much more hands-on and in DS's passion area.

thanks,
Dazey

Well no, but my DS6 Just got accepted into the John Hopkins CTYOnline. We are hoping it will work out.
I do hear good things, you are lucky to live close to attend the classes.

I have a 3rd grader, and we attended the program last weekend in Baltimore. My dd's passion is science, so she had the time of her life. They spent half the day on a boat on the Chesapeake where they did water quality testing, navigation, and had the opportunity to drop the nets and investigate what they caught. The other half of the day was spent dissecting oysters, identifying plankton in local water samples, and calculating and comparing the square footage on a map of the port of Baltimore from the 1700's to a current map.

I definitely agree that the 5-7th grade options seem much more interesting, and we're anxious to get there. However, we felt that this activity was run in a way that was appropriate for the kids involved. Most of the kids there that day were in fourth grade. In our group there was one other third grader and one second grader.

I am familiar with the aquarium the program you are considering will be held at, and I have also wondered how involved it will be. We have family in that area and have been there a few times and felt we have seen all there was to see there.

Maybe someone with more experience at these programs will chime in. I am hoping they're all as wonderful as the one we attended last weekend.

Ds9 did a similar Baltimore Boat thing last May, he really enjoyed it. He has since then been sharing a few facts about the old navy, etc. He went with Dh, however so I don't have the been-there first hand knowledge. I think they went on two different boats and got to steer it and checked out plankton and daily life for boys on board a ship like that. It had both social studies and science components.
He wants to try an archeology class if we do it again, so I think that's got to be a good sign.