At another they learned boating safety and all about PFDs.  That's personal floatation devices, lifejackets, flotation cushions, and the like.

 

One of the favorite stops was the Reptiles and Amphibians station.  They could look at salamanders, turtles and snakes and hold them if they wanted.

   

At the Tree Cookie station the kids learned about the parts of a tree.  They each determined the age of a slice of a log (tree cookie) then decorated it and made it into a necklace.

 

They investigated how water is processed to make it safe to drink at the Water Treatment station.  They talked about the various contaminants that had to be considered when purifying water.

 

Soil Science was another station.   Here the students learn about what is underfoot; the layers of soil, how those layers are formed, how they are different from each other and how they are sampled.  Each class got a jar with water, pebbles, sand, clay, and other soil components that they could use in their classroom to see how erosion and redeposition can create new layers in the bottom of a lake or ocean.

 

The classes saw a demonstration of frontier tools and how they were used to make the things that early settlers needed.  Special purpose axes, saws, and adzes were used to shape logs just like those that were used in building log homes.

 

At the Wood Science station they looked at some of the many ways that we use forest products every day.  They also checked for open channels within wood samples by checking if they could blow bubbles through them.

At our station the kids were introduced to some properties of liquid nitrogen and we then used it to demonstrate some weather processes.  We looked at and felt the fog, clouds, frost and snow that form when air cools near the ground or at high altitudes.  All of these are formed because when air is cooled the moisture it contains condenses or freezes out.   We talked about the gasses that air is made of and the really big number of molecules that are in a balloon.  Some of the students knew that air expands when it is heated but watching a balloon cooled in liquid nitrogen shrink to almost nothing then expand to it's original size when allowed to warm again really brought that point home.  We had some fun freezing a flower and crushing it and driving a nail into a board using a frozen banana.  But the thing that I am sure they would all say was the best part of this stop was when their teachers helped us make ice cream in 30 seconds or less.  Well actually, the best part was eating it.   Go to our Cryogenics web page for more experiments with liquid nitrogen.

    

It is always rewarding when we help kids have fun learning through science.

If you want to know more about any of the stations or the overall program please e-mail your questions and I will try to get the answers for you.

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