'Koala Talkers' dig ham radio at DeLand school

This week, the kindergartener at Starke Elementary in DeLand, Florida, also had the chance to talk about Christmas plans and pets with a Horizon Elementary student in Port Orange, using amateur radio.

Samara is one of the "Koala Talkers," named for Starke's school mascot, who are learning about ham radio with the help of volunteers from the Daytona Beach Amateur Radio Association.

Starke, which started the program in November as part of its after-school program, is the third Volusia County school to get involved with the ham radio program. Samsula Academy also participates.

"Our goal is to stimulate young minds," said Doug Hubbs, a DeLand ham radio operator for 31 years who is helping out with the program at Starke. "We're not trying to make ham radio operators out of them. If we do, fine. If not, we've sown the seed of curiosity."

Plenty of those seeds were sown Wednesday as children huddled around Hubbs and volunteers from the Daytona Beach club to practice Morse Code, talk on the radio and learn how robots work.

Until the Koala Talkers program began, third-grader Jordan Roberts didn't know anything about ham radios.

"I've seen a Morse Code thing in a book, one of those tappers," the 9-year-old said, but now he's learning firsthand how it can be used to communicate across the street or around the world.

"Electronics are cool," Jordan said, talking about how communications technology has progressed in recent years. "They didn't have hand-held phones. They had to plug them into the wall, and now they have this wireless stuff."

For children who've grown up with cell phones, e-mail and the Internet, learning about ham radios is a new experience, said Kathleen Messina, who coordinates Starke's after-school program. "In this age of computers and iPods, they have no idea about this," she said.