By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
Many school districts around Kansas, including Great Bend USD 428, will celebrate Spring Break the week of March 13-17. But that does not mean the learning has to pause. Director Curtis Wolf said activities planned for each afternoon during the break at the Kansas Wetlands Education Center.
"It makes sense to provide these opportunities when people are available," he said. "Spring Break, obviously, is a time when kids are out of school. A lot of times, families are looking for things to do. Hopefully the weather's good, so people are wanting to get out and about. We offer Spring Break activities. These are just drop-in, come-and-go, free activities that happen during the afternoons during Spring Break."
Pam Martin and Mandy Kern do most of the educational programming at KWEC, but Wolf said Spring Break will be a good time to let part-time staffers and graduate students in on the fun. "This is a great opportunity for them to get the experience of coming up with a program, putting together promotional materials for it, then actually doing the program," he said.
The activities run from 1 to 4 p.m. daily, but will be available anytime during that period. Various activities will be available for grades K-12 daily.
"Each day will be a different program," Wolf said. "In past years, we've had families come out every single afternoon to catch the new program. It's very come-and-go, very informal. Come out and spend just a little time at the center, do the activity, come and check out the other exhibits."
The topic for Monday, March 13, will be frogs with a craft activity planned. Tuesday is bird adaptations and a bird bingo game. "Where Birds Lie" is the theme for Wednesday, with the opportunity to craft a nest. Thursday will tie in various birds to the popular Pokemon game, and nature journaling is the subject of Friday's activity. Martin will also host the Turtle Tots program for ages 3-5 on Friday from 10:15 to 11:15 a.m, with the topic of animal eyes.