Summer Holiday Program

Gardens Point Precinct is a hive of fun activities this January with QUT’s Summer Holiday Program for children aged 5 years and older, happening across the QUT campus.

Dive into The Cube at QUT and explore the new interactive screen project The Living Reef. Discover wonders of the underwater world, take part in fun family-friendly activities, and join a guided tour of some of the iconic venues at QUT's Gardens Point campus.

The Living Reef is a digital marine ecosystem featuring fascinating interactive on-screen activities for kids. Turtle Tangle allows visitors to cut away ghost nets to free a turtle and Reef Ranger allows visitors to navigate RangerBot - an underwater vehicle developed by QUT's Professor Matthew Dunbabin.

View a range of dry coral and sand specimens under the microscope at QUT's Reef and Coral Research Zone. Test out your coral and marine life identification skills with the Virtual Reef Diver card game and get up close to sea creatures without getting wet at the virtual reality Living Reef.

Book into a Water Works Workshop presented by QUT's Extreme Science Van. This workshop is designed to get students thinking about the importance of water quality including hands-on water treatment and testing. Attendees will perform tests for turbidity and pH, and use microscopes to examine pond life.

STEMPunks is presentiing the immersive Reef 3D and VR Workshop, asking students to explore the challenges facing the reef and discuss solutions for marine life. Participants will use 3D design STEM Tools to design and create their own underwater world with turtles, dolphins, sharks and more, and learn how to use Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality to explore their new 3D world.

The Reef Challenge workshop will tackle environmental issues and solutions. Budding entrepreneurs are asked to think big, and pitch a product or service which could benefit the Great Barrier Reef. At the end of the day, parents are invited to watch the presentations with awards going to the winning team. 
 

Kids can get creative cutting, colouring and weaving sea animals from simple paper, craft, and recycled materials at the Ocean Creations drop-in space.

Learn the basics of robotics at Sphero Sea Rescue, a fun interactive activity for kids and families. Navigate Sphero around a range of obstacles and through the course to complete a sea rescue mission. Don't forget to watch out for sharks.

Hear about historical figures, their experiments and discover the key principles of physics at Physics Observatory.  Get zapped by a Tesla coil, change the gravity in the environment, drop weights from a great height, and find out how long light takes to travel across the Solar System. 

Join a Mark Makers walking tour of QUT's Gardens Point Campus. Learn about inventors who have inspired STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) projects at The Cube, discover works of art by acclaimed artists at the QUT Art Museum and William Robinson Gallery, and uncover history at the heritage-listed Old Government House.

Travel down memory lane with your kids at The Retro Arcade featuring 80s style games including Block Breakers, Parabola Pirates and Mighty Pucks - an ice hockey game where beautiful pixel graphics combine with fast based action. Each game offers behind-the-scenes mathematical insights, capable of showing off the algorithms that go into achieving simple arcade fun.

A highlight of QUT's Summer Holiday Program is Family Fun Day on Saturday, January 11. This fun day out for the whole family showcases QUT's research and offers even more hands-on, free activities for kids.

Nice to know - Visitors who park at QUT's two public carparks on weekends receive a low daily rate of $10. Visitors who park on weekdays are eligible to receive a discounted rate of $5 per hour or part thereof. Discounts only apply to parking tickets validated by staff at Old Government House front desk between 10-4. 

Image credits: Patria Jannides except first and sixth image

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