SOUTHHAVE, Mississippi USA — They have snorkeled with manatees in Florida and viewed American bison, elk and dinosaur embryos in the West.

They visited the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, Mont., inspected fossils and met a paleontologist who served as technical adviser on the "Jurassic Park" movies.

They got a chance to go cross country skiing and snowmobiling and they saw Old Faithful erupt at Yellowstone National Park.

Andrea Whaley, 12, a member of the Science Club, launches her rocket in front of the school during the club's year-end project. Photo: Thomas Busler.

Josh Russell, a science teacher and a sponsor of the Science Club at DeSoto Central Middle, helps students prepare their rockets for launching. Photo: Thomas Busler.

Members of the DeSoto Central Middle School Science Club have also raced model dragsters and pushed a button that sent their model rockets blasting into the sky from the school's parking lot.

Science comes to life for the club's members, said Cynthia Dixon, seventh-grade science teacher and a club sponsor.

"We want to provide them with something beyond the classroom," Dixon said recently as the youngsters prepared to fire their rockets in an end-of-the-year activity.

"It goes above and beyond what the normal child of this age (grades 6-8) would get. Our whole goal when we initially set up the science club several years ago was ... to do things with students who are really interested in science."

Also, Dixon said, "We want to keep their interest, do enough cool things to where they really want to learn more about science, which hopefully will help them one day to form a career."

The club members with teachers and parent chaperones take one trip each year. Last year's trip was to Crystal River, Fla., to visit the manatees and other science-related activities in the area.

This year, the club traveled to Montana during Jan. 28-Feb. 3, with the visit to Yellowstone on the way back.

"Every year, we try to spotlight an endangered species or at least look into the animals of the area," Dixon said.

The club, which meets once a month, has 35 members this year. Making the trip out West this year were 25 students and 29 adults. The club's other faculty sponsors are sixth-grade science teachers Josh Russell, Meribeth Long and Scott Thweatt.

John Frye, father of John Frye Jr., 12, a seventh-grader, was among the parents making the trip this year.

"We had a good time," Frye said. "Yellowstone was a big part of it. We got to see Old Faithful. We learned about some of the different rock formations, chemicals and things that are underground there."

Frye said the downhill skiing was a "blast" for his son. "We learned about gravity," he said.

Also, Frye said, "The science club is a good thing that kind of makes him connected to school more than anything else because he is really into it and thinks a lot of the teachers that sponsor the club."

Jennifer Frye, John Jr.'s mom, agreed. "The school and the teachers have really brought out his interest in science," she said.

John Jr. said his favorite among the club activities at the school is the year-long project that culminates at the end of year. Last year, it was the dragsters; this year the rockets.

When his rocket reached its peak height above the parking lot, its parts failed to separate preventing its parachute from opening.

As she watched it plummet downward, Elizabeth Walters, 14, an eighth-grade club member, said, "Ohhhh, poor John."

It was damaged when it hit the parking lot.

Jennifer Frye said, "The heat (from the propellant) made it stick together because it was a little damp. ... He is glad that it went off. He just liked watching it when it went up into the air."

The parachutes also failed to open on several of the other rockets.

Elizabeth said she followed the directions and measured everything carefully in putting her rocket together. "It's a good rocket," she said. "It went off and it went off high."

Elizabeth said she is interested in environmental things and that both of her parents have science degrees. Her father is a laser safety officer in his job and her mother is a licensed physical therapist.

"They were trying to raise me with science when I was little," she said.

She said her grandmother is an lawyer and is not in science per se. But, she said, "She has had to do a lot of stuff with like murder cases and all the forensics so I have gotten a lot from her, too."

Chance McWilliams, 14, an eighth-grader, said he liked the rocket project. "I had to actually do it (build the rocket) pretty much by myself with a little help from my mom," he said.

Mac Williamson, 12, a sixth-grader, said, "It was really cool."

Copyright © 2008, The Commercial Appeal.