The word on Slinkys......
For our project this week, we made a Slinky game.  If you're not familiar with how to get the Slinky to walk down a slope, here is a tip.  Set the Slinky at the top of slope, the pull the top rings over and down to the slope surface --directly downhill of the rest of the Slinky.  If you place them off to one side, the the Slinky may eventually start to roll instead of walk.

The best slope for these Slinkys seems to be around 18-20 degrees.  But you can experiment to see what happens if you use a steeper or shallower slope.

Why do curve balls curve?  How do ice skaters spin?  And how do you get an awesome jump in the half pipe on your snowboard?  There is physics behind all these movements that athletes use to create super performances in the Olympics.  With some simple experiments, we're demonstrating what the physics is this week. Yesterday, our 3-5th graders built some awesome ski jumps to test how velocity, friction and gravity all affect a downhill skier's performance.

A TIP for playing your wacky straw instruments: put the end of the last straw in the crook of your elbow and hold it there by gently closing your arm on it (not too tight!).  This makes it much easier to get a sound than it is when you put the straw behind your knee or in your armpit.  The sound may be less offensive to sensitive persons, as well.  We had one talented student this week play "Happy Birthday". 

It's remarkable how science builds on the past discoveries of early scientists.  Without Einstein's Theory of Relativity, we wouldn't have renowned physicist Stephen Hawkings' ideas on surviving black holes and the possibility of time travel.  And even though Galileo was wrong about some things (like some of his pendulum experiment conclusions), he was very right about others (like the sun being in the center of our solar system).  And then there are scientists like Jane Goodall. Thirty and more years of quietly working in Gombe has given the world a treasure of knowledge about primates. Hopefully, each and every child who comes to class this week is inspired by these examples to follow their own dreams!

Care Instructions for your Live Caterpillar

Your Painted Lady caterpillar will be ready to make its chrysalis in a few days.  Here's what will happen:

• The caterpillar will climb to the top of the cup and hang from the lid. It will shed its skin one more time.
  
• Over 1-2 days, the chrysalis will slowly form a hard case around its body.  Do not shake or disturb it as it may damage the caterpillar at this stage.
  
• The chrysalis will begin to darken and the adult butterfly will emerge in 7-10 days. It will hang from the chrysalis. There may be some reddish or yellow liquid called meconium.  Its just waste liquid from the metamorphosis process.
  
• The new butterfly will have crumpled wings. It will slowly expand them out as it pumps blood into them. The proboscis will be in two halves that will join together. Then your butterfly is ready to fly.
  
• Soak a tissue in sugar water (3 teaspoons sugar in 1 cup water) and place it in the bottom of the container your butterfly is in for the butterfly to feed from.  You can also feed it a slice of orange, apple or watermelon.
  
• let the butterfly climb up onto your hand and set it free to look for flowers with nectar.
  

Here's What You Can Do to Prepare:

• Find a mason jar, bottle or small box to contain your butterfly once it emerges.
  
• After the chrysalis is a few days old, open the cup. Remove any stringy strands so they won't tangle up the butterfly when it emerges.
  
• Tape the cup lid across the open top of your jar or box.  You can gently cover the opening with some cloth or screen to prevent the butterfly from escaping.
  
• If your chrysalis falls to the ground, that's OK.  The butterfly can still emerge, it just won't have gravity to help it out.
  
• When you release it outdoors, it will be free to begin the amazing life cycle all over again.  You can encourage butterflies to stay in your garden by planting host plants for the caterpillars and nectar plants for the adults.
  

Hopefully, some day we will all get a chance to live in a house with a green roof!  There are a tremendous number of different designs available - the key is to make sure the house is structurally sound before adding the weight of soil and/or gravel on top.  The good news is, some cultures like the Scandinavians, have been building green roofs for thousands of years, so there is lots of experience and data out there about them.  I don't recommend planting trees up on the roof, but grass or any small plants that doesn't have a tap root could do well.  The NC Nature Research Center has a small green roof that is planted with tiny succulents.

Less good..........

Great class on honeybees this week!  Mr. Sean brought in one of his observation hives so we could inside and see the bees at work. We also got to taste honey sticks from a local farmer's market vendor.
Make sure to keep those pollinator garden sheets moist while the flower seeds are germinating!
For those who are interested in extending the learning, here are two citizen science projects about bees that you can get involved in.

ZomBee
A citizen science project tracking the honey bee parasite Apocephalus borealis.  For more advanced students - you can make a light trap to collect parasitized bees and send them in to the scientists.
https://www.zombeewatch.org/

BumbleBee Watch
Bumble Bee Watch is a collaborative effort to track and conserve North America’s bumble bees.  You can upload photos to the website.
http://bumblebeewatch.org/

This week's class is on bioremediation.....using plants, mushrooms and microbes to help clean up the soil and water.  It was a hit with the 3-5 grade class, some of whom are becoming enthusiastic environmentalists.  For the younger ones, keeping concepts simple is key.....after all, a preschooler can't be expected to understand pollution, heavy metals and toxicity. How depressing!  BUT..... beautiful plants clean up the soil in the same way that they are learning how to clean up their room.  Plus, plants are fun to grow.  

I always like to pass on information for parents too in the topics I select for class. So if anyone has concerns about lead-based paint flaking from their house, for example....well, now you know you can grow sunflowers all around your home to take care of it. (Just dispose of them appropriately at the end of the season.)

Inexpensive, beautiful and effective. Way cool science!

Check out this robot we made in science class.  We called it Spin-o-Bot or Ballerina-Bot. When you put two of them near each other, they can battle.  These are made with the simplest of parts.  We got one dollar toothbrushes from Dollar Tree, pulled off the brush heads, and added various robot parts.  Best science project ever!

The fall of 2015 is a great time for moon watching.  On August 29, we get a SuperMoon!  This means that the moon is at epigee - closest in its orbit to the earth. Watch out if you are at the beach, because this means the tides will be extra high as the moon's gravitational pull is strong.  There is also a full lunar eclipse on September 27, beginning at 8:10 pm and going into full totality at 10:11 pm.

The Moon formed some 100,000 years after the formation of the solar system when a Mars-sized planet collided with the early-forming earth.  The debris from that collision scattered in three directions: some pieces condensed to become the earth as we know it today; other pieces condensed to become our Moon, and the rest were flung out into the asteroid belt.  Sometimes we sill get meteorites that are pieces from the Moon.  Scientists can identify them using a unique heat signature, which tells them when and how the meteorite was formed.

There are many unusual minerals on the moon.  My favorite is one called Armalcolite. It is named after the first three astronauts to the moon - Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins.