Science story funday

Walking in the sunshine, exploring the landscape and its history and scavenging materials and ideas along the way we had a constructive time combining story-making and science!

The day started at the Hengistbury Head Visitor Centre, talking with volunteers and exploring the garden and exhibits.We learned about the land use and people who lived on Hengistbury Head 12,000 years ago and how they used naturally occurring materials such as flint to create weapons and tools.

Martin led the group over the top to the triangulation point and introduced us to the smell of gorse flowers.... try them - you'll be so surprised they smell of coconut! Even more surprising Bill informed us that you can eat the closed flowers.

We scavenged for ideas along the harbour shoreline, collecting wood, string and other interesting objects for raft and art making before heading over to the beach side for more of the same.

We took the ferry back to Mudeford Quay and spent some time creating characters for stories, creating beach art and making a raft before getting stuck into science experiments looking at how salty the harbour is compared to freshwater and brine solution we made up.

We experienced for real how the water level changes as the tide comes in and consumed our Mudeford Monster and Dragon. We're really looking forward to the Super tide on 22 February!

Some new things participants learned:
"Tides are different"
"Tides come in at different times"
"Freshwater floats on saltwater"
"There's a hill [over there] with an important person buried in there"
"How easy it is to make creatures on the beach"

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Project TNT - Wk3

With thanks to Highcliffe School the scarcity of pipettes was resolved and the requested re-run of penny drops was a huge success. The first part of the practical session was devoted to further investigation of floating and sinking, density and surface tension.

A leader board for the number of drops of water on a penny saw 50 drops on one penny! Everyone was able to make their own rainbow by layering different concentrations of salt solution before we set about designing and making boats. Next week we’ll be racing them down a tank and they have to safely carry six pennies.

This week we introduced activity books and stickers, adding in pictures and diagrams to explain the science and capture the memories of all the things we are exploring each week.

With plenty of helpers there is space for a few others to join in this friendly group! Contact Jae Harris at CAYP on 07785 935928or just turn up and complete the medical forms.

Thanks to Tina, Mandy and Tracey for the toast!

Monday, January 26, 2015

Project TNT-Wk2

The theme for the week was sinking and floating.  This week, the Time and Tide storyteller Martin Maudsley brought smuggling tales, thrills and riddles to Project TNT to add a different dimension to our experimentation. 

The session started with our usual icebreaker session testing our memory of everyone’s names before a game of ‘Harbour Run-around’. Then it was time for water. We made Cartesian divers for those who had missed out while Martin taught us some origami skills and explored the properties of paper when wet and dry. We then designed boats for smugglers and found interesting places to hide our goods of screws and pennies.

We explored density and how we can make something sink or float on purpose. We are still waiting for our pipettes to arrive....

We used 3kg of cornflour and enjoyed hitting it hard to squash all of the molecules together so it looked hard, but when we left items on the surface they would sink. Martin talked about mud and hiding contraband in the mud and how smugglers used their knowledge of the tides to sink boats or boxes so they could be found later, under darkness when the tide went out.

While we were experimenting we talked about the smugglers from Christchurch and developed ideas for pirates names such as Barnacle Bill.  

 

Monday, January 26, 2015