There's water all over the desks, dripping onto the floor beneath. Kids are getting wet, trying to float Styrofoam cups full of marbles in clear plastic tubs filled with water. They're talking over each other, filling the classroom with so much chatter that their teacher uses a whistle to get their attention.

These students are attending a summer science camp at Glen City School in Santa Paula, where they're taking classes in biology, chemistry, physics and math. But instead of reading textbooks, or listening to their teacher lecture, they're spending their days doing experiments.

This is what science should be about — kids exploring, asking questions, figuring out scientific concepts on their own, said Jerry Clifford, a physics lecturer at CSU Channel Islands in Camarillo, who helped organize the camp.

'We're just allowing kids to be inquisitive,' Clifford said. 'All kids start with curiosity, and we kill it.'

The camp's philosophy reflects the Next Generation Science Standards, which schools have adopted over the past several years, aiming to encourage, rather than kill, students' natural curiosity, said Jeff Colborn, the camp's lead teacher.

'With these new standards, we'll start giving kids permission to find the answers to their own questions,' said Colborn, who teaches chemistry at Santa Paula High School. 'If we put students in the footsteps of the people who discovered these (scientific principles), they're going to own this information.'

The students working with the Styrofoam cups and marbles? They were testing principles of buoyancy — figuring out if they could make the cup float, why it floats and how heavy it had to be before it didn't float.

Irma Rodriguez, 11, was comparing her Styrofoam cup to a cruise ship, trying to figure out if a wider hull would allow the ship to be heavier but still float.

'I love science and how things work,' said Irma, a sixth-grader who wants to be a zoologist. Her career goal: go to Madagascar and discover a new species.

The four teachers leading the activities are also learning, getting comfortable with a different way of teaching science, said Alfonso Gamino, superintendent of the Santa Paula Unified School District.

'We're trying to get elementary teachers to engage more and more in science,' he said. 'The last few years have been focused on language and math, which is important. We're still doing that, but now we're expanding into science, which is obviously a good place to do these hands-on activities.'

This is the first year the district has offered the free 16-day summer science camp, which is running through Tuesday.

Gamino got the idea from Clifford, who has been running a similar camp in the Rio School District for the past three summers. Santa Paula is paying for the camp, which cost about $25,000, with additional funding that low-income school districts are getting from the state, Gamino said.

Students had to apply to the camp, writing an essay explaining why they wanted to attend. Eighty students were chosen, and the camp had about 45 kids on a waiting list, Clifford said.

Rio's program has tripled since it started, and Clifford looks forward to Santa Paula's program growing, too.

Next year, the plan is to offer eight classes, rather than four, and double the enrollment, he said. Not everyone who attends will grow up to be a scientist. But that's OK because, ultimately, the camp is about life skills, Clifford said.

'Employers want people who can solve problems, be enthusiastic and work well with other people,' Clifford said. 'That's what these kids are doing — they're working in groups, always problem-solving.'

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