Science in the Library

This summer I tried a new science workshop at the Pasadena Central Library, for tweens ages 9 and up, using the website http://www.curiositymachine.org . This is a great website for librarians, teachers and homeschooling parents, with its collection of projects, how-to videos, and opportunities for children to interact with scientists and get feedback on their projects. Free science classes are definitely in high demand, and even after I split it up into two classes the spots filled up right away! We started each class learning about some science concept and then applying what we learned to a hands-on challenge. We learned about Newton’s laws of motion, tessellations, the aerodynamics of bird flight, and simple machines. We: Shot stomp rockets, Made bird wings that could be flapped hard enough to rotate us around in an office chair, Engineered honeycomb structures strong enough to hold a stack of dictionaries, And designed sharp levers for picking up and breaking e...

I've been doing science activities in the public library for the last couple of years but realized today that it's time I started sharing them with the wider world! I'm thinking what I'll do is post what I learn or what projects I can make from books. I may not post every day or every week, just when I have something worth posting. Today's picture worth posting is of a cube bubble blower I made after reading about it in this book: Truly a wonderful book every library should own! After reading that you could do this, I simply had to try it myself. And then I had to share it with the kids in my Curiosity Machine class! First the bubble makes a square shape inside, but if you can manage to catch another bubble in it as you put it back into your bubble mixture, the result is a cube! Try it at home! I used craft wire to make mine. You could try making different kinds of prismatic bubble holders (pyramids, dodecahedron or other polyhedrons) and see...