IN THE CLASSROOM:

Editor’s note: The Boys & Girls Club doesn’t allow full identification of students in the after-school activities.

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School was out Monday across the Newport-Mesa Unified School District as teachers took a day for staff development. But the Boys & Girls Club of the Harbor Area took care of kids whose parents were working.

For the 30 or so kids hanging around playing Wii, working in the computer lab or fooling around with blocks at the Westside branch of the club at Rea Elementary, it was a day more about fun than the club’s usual programs.

“Normally we have our ‘Power Hour’ where they have to do their homework before they can play, but it’s a little looser because school’s out,” said the branch’s director, Steve Lampron.

That doesn’t mean the kids weren’t learning. In fact, some learned how to make snow in a jar. Lampron pulled out a jar of a grainy white powder and added a little bit of water. The substance slowly puffed up until he could scoop it up in his hand. Then he showed how some blue or red granules added to the mix could turn it the color of a snow cone.

“Everybody who wants some, raise your hand,” Lampron said to the dozen or so children huddled around a table.

Heidy, 10, of Rea Elementary, had seen the white stuff before, and asked Lampron to pull it out to help her do a class science project.

“It’s part of my grade at school, for science class,” she said. “My table had to do a snowstorm.”

A few not from Newport-Mesa schools scribbled on homework, but most were at play. Most popular of all, however, was the computer lab, where nearly 30 kids played games on a row of computers, sometimes asking for spelling help to enter in websites from those assisting.

“This really helps with the digital divide,” Lampron said. “A lot of these kids don’t have computers at home, and they’re able to print out their assignments and learn their way around these machines.”

It was popular with the kids too: For Fani, 10, it was a chance to play her favorite games in a less-crowded lab than normal, when students would be rotated out every 45 minutes or so.

“My favorite games are the cooking ones,” she said.

On a day like this, the fun was all part of the plan, because the kids still get a stable environment teaching them respect and working within the rules, Lampron said.

“Have fun, be safe and have respect” are the club’s three principles, and that’s just what the kids did, he said.

MICHAEL ALEXANDER may be reached at (714) 966-4618 or at michael.alexander@ latimes.com.