Fascinating insights into the world of research – that’s what the Children’s University is offering eight- to twelve-year-olds again this year. The lectures will cover topics including animated films, how to use WhatsApp and similar apps safely, and dwarves in physics. Advance ticket sales for the ‘spring term’ are now open.
And, of course, Kuni, the KinderUni mascot, needs help again and is looking for a ‘camera child’ and a ‘gong child’ for each lecture. Anyone keen to take a peek behind the scenes at the KinderUni can sign up online via the KinderUni website.
Tickets for the Children’s University’s “Spring Semester” will be available from 11 February. The semester begins on 2 March with the lecture “Pictures, Comics, Cartoons – How Snow White Changed Storytelling”. Dr Mareile Oetken from the Institute for German Studies will explain how picture stories evolved into comics with speech bubbles, and what comics actually have to do with animated films. In his lecture on 9 March, physicist Prof. Dr Christoph Lienau will take the Children’s University students on a journey into the modern world of ‘nannos’, which means ‘dwarves’ in Greek. He’ll show them how these tiny creatures can be made visible, and how physicists talk to them, play with them and conduct research on them. The third lecture of the spring semester, on 16 March, will focus on the topic of punishment: a footballer who commits a foul is shown a yellow card. A pupil who cheats gets a six. Anyone who does something wrong is punished. But is punishment really necessary? Or could things be completely different? The legal scholar Prof. Dr Dr Volker Boehme-Neßler explores these questions in depth with the children.
The lectures all begin at 4.30 pm. Doors to the Lecture Theatre Centre (A14) on the Haarentor campus open at 4.00 pm. Tickets (€2.50) for the three spring lectures will be available from Thursday 11 February via www.kinderuni-oldenburg.de, as well as at the offices of the Nordwest-Zeitung and all Nordwest Ticket GmbH ticket outlets. Adults do not need a ticket – they are not permitted in the lecture theatre. They can watch the lectures on a screen in the foyer of the Lecture Theatre Centre.
As well as the lectures, there are many other opportunities to get involved under the umbrella of the KinderUniversität: for example, in the university’s chemistry laboratory (CHEMOL), the Wadden Sea Learning Lab, the physiXS Teaching and Learning Lab, or online with ‘Physics for Kids’ and the Lernwerkstatt. The Oldenburg House of Natural Sciences (NAWI-Haus) offers courses in physics, chemistry, biology and technology. Similarly, the ‘Green School’ activity days in the Botanical Garden and the ‘School of the Senses’ invite children to get involved. They can experience art up close and get creative themselves in the workshops at the Kunsthalle Emden, the Horst Janssen Museum and the Oldenburg City Museum.
The KinderUniversität project would not be possible without the support of its sponsors. The Landessparkasse zu Oldenburg (LzO) is once again the main sponsor this year. The project also receives significant support from the Oldenburg Employers’ Association (Arbeitgeberverband Oldenburg e.V.), the EWE Foundation and the business association ‘Der Kleine Kreis e.V.’. The media partners Nordwest-Zeitung, NDR 1 Niedersachsen and Radio Bremen Vier also make a major contribution to the success of the KinderUniversität.
