Types of Out-of-School Programming
In planning for professional development of out-of-school activity leaders, it is helpful to have a sense of the types of out-of-school programs already offered by community-based organizations, as well as the constraints they may encounter.
We suggest that, well before planning a professional development program, you survey participants and the organizations they work for to find out how science and engineering activities might fit into their vision for serving their youth.
There are multiple scheduling formats that can be successful for offering science and engineering activities to youth. They range from presenting activities once a week, or even once a month, to offering more-extensive ongoing science programs across the course of a year. The amount of time activity leaders are able to dedicate to these science and engineering activities can determine how you design the professional development for your participants.
Some typical science offerings during an out-of-school program include, but are not limited to,
- One half hour of free choice activity once a week
- One or two 45- to 50-minute sessions once a week
- One multiple-hour session on a weekend
- Evening events involving families
- A summer camp program offering focused projects for an hour or more each day
- A science club that meets for a couple of hours per week throughout the year
The frequency (every week, once per month) and duration of time (hours per session) specifically dedicated to science and engineering activities makes a huge difference in the way both the staff and the youth experience a science program. Obviously, to get the most out of participating in these types of activities, children must have repeated opportunities to think about, practice, and discuss science activities. Program leaders also benefit from having a stable, recurrent schedule for project-based science and engineering activities. A regular schedule allows both children and program leaders to make connections between their experiences in multiple sessions and to become more deeply engaged in the project.
It is also useful to get a sense of the challenges activity leaders may encounter in implementing science activities on a regular basis, as well as the goals of the particular community-based organization with whom you are working.
- Priorities for particular types of activities may shift due to funding or to the interests of parents and youth.
- Science activities may be considered optional, serving only a small segment of the youth attending their program.
- The physical setting available for doing science programming may involve sharing space with other ongoing activities or presenting activities in an open room full of distractions.
These limitations should be kept in mind when considering what activity leaders can accomplish in this kind of environment, and time should be allotted for problem solving these types of issues during the professional development program.
(For more information about surveying the needs of your participants, see Context Considerations.)
