This month I’ve been out at the elementary schools in Roswell exploring patterns with students from kindergarten to 5th grade, lifeskills to gifted. The year is off to a good start; I’m visiting 24 classrooms and about 450 students. We are exploring science, math, and art as we look in the classrooms for patterns and make simple examples of patterns. Elementary students love science for the most part. They think it’s fun. They haven’t been convinced that it’s hard, or too much math. They are excited by experiments and activities they can do, have fun, and be successful learners. The teachers seem to enjoy it as well. With some of the classes we looked at the Sierpinski Triangle, a simple fractal that can be constructed by students as a math activity. I left this with the teachers to do as a math activity if they chose. I got it from the Fractal Foundation (Albuquerque) website ( www.fractalfoundation.com ). They brought a spectacular fractal show to Goddard Planetarium in January last year, and I am planning to have them come again after the winter break.
Next month, October, I’ll go back to the classrooms to explore gravity with the students. We will build small roller coasters (marble runs) of different materials, explore poppers and balls and how high they can bounce, play Mousetrap, Jacob’s ladder, ring toss, and other gravity based games, and talk about why they work and what would happen on planets with lighter and heavier gravity. We’ll also talk about what students weigh on other planets, and why; and do some activities that don't work because of gravity. The students will have a good time trying to defy gravity and I will take lots of pictures.
October features Science Saturday and the Roswell Museum and Art Center Block Party on the 10th. Goddard Planetarium will feature "More Than Meets the Eye" star show for Science Saturday (10am), and present the continuous program "Viewspace" for visitors the rest of the day. For those of you not familiar with "Viewspace," it's an astronomy exhibit that never goes out of date. It's a continuous feed video from the National Space Telescope Science Institute that presents short segments from NASA and others about what's happening on Earth and in space including a Hubble update, Mars Rover update, and others. The Block Party is going to be a lot of fun and lots of it, including the planetarium events, are free. Hope to see you there.
Later in the month, on October 15 (7pm) we continue our video series of the space race to the moon with the third show, "The Last Empty Sky," which explores Robert Goddard and Werner von Braun's contributions. On October 20 (7pm), Family Science Night gets into ooey, gooey, slimy, and glowy Halloween fun! All in all, it's going to be a lively month!
