Science Roadshow

Recently selected students attended the Science Roadshow where they got to explore lots of different hands on science equipment. We learnt about the physical properties of materials and how sounds waves vary in length...

Lighting up a Town

The Senior Science Club watched a video to see how shanty town houses in Manila can get light, not from electricity (expensive) or candles (too dangerous), but from soft drink bottles!  We spent the first session making a cardboard house . . . next week we will work on the light

 We used corrugated cardboard for the roof and painted it to look like a rusty iron roof. We filled a 2 litre soft drink bottle with water and bleach and secured it to the circular hole in the middle of the roof.  Then we transported the shanty house to the Library so the whole school could see what we had been doing, and maybe take a look.

Daniel couldn't wait to try it out - he was so keen, he didn't even take time to remove his his art shirt! You can see how much light filters down through the water, to light our cardboard hut.

The Work Bench

People who come to Science Clubs, whether Junior or Senior, have the chance of working on the Work Bench.  This is where we can disassemble electrical items and see what goes on inside.  So far, we have dismantled a toaster, mobile phone, lap top, computer and two kettles.  It was interesting to see how many tiny components there are in a key board.

PLEASE SEND ANY OLD ELECTRICAL ITEMS YOU NO LONGER CAN USE TO COCKLE BAY SCHOOL SO WE CAN DISMANTLE THEM AND SEE HOW THEY WORK.

Bubble Art

In Art Week, the Junior Science Club did bubble art.  There were plenty of bubbles of all different colours.

Salt Art

In Art Week, the Senior Science Club made salt art.  First we sketched out a pattern using PVA glue in a squeezy bottle.  Next we covered the PVA outline in salt so that it was completely covered.  After we tapped away the excess salt to use for the next picture, we coloured the salty outlines with food colouring.  It was exciting watching the colour move along the white lines and merge with other colours at curves and intersections.  We liked how the salt crystals made the picture glisten in the bright light.

M&Ms experiment

In the first Art Week, the Junior Science Club made watery patterns with m&ms.  We carefully dropped different coloured m&ms in water and watched the sugar coating dissolve.  The dye made very distinct patterns on the surface of the water.  Best of all, we could eat the m&ms at the end of the experiment.  We found that wet chocolate is just as delicious as dry!

Visitors

We have all sorts of visitors at school.  A rabbit kindly made our aquaintance and a Monarch butterfly stayed temporarily in the Butterfly Hospital as he tried to pump open his wings properly after hatching from his chyrsalis.