One amazing mother (Kami H.) in the CVHS group coordinated an awesome Science Day held at Utah State University Tuesday afternoon.
The next class I went to was dissecting a pig's heart and lungs. Dr. Anderson told us about what we were going to do before we did it. Then, one of his students told us about the different parts we would be cutting and feeling. We put on aprons and gloves. First, we cut the heart. Then, we looked inside it and put our fingers in the holes. We got to feel its heart strings. They were so strong that you could hold the heart up by them. Next, we cut and looked at how the blood went through. After we were done with the heart we did the lungs. We cut through the part where the air goes down. At the end there were two holes that went down to each lung. Then, we got to carry it over to the sink and we got to push the air in with the air hose and the lungs blew up like a balloon. I think the flap closed on one of the lungs because it stayed up like a balloon, so when we got back to our table, we popped it. I used my fist and my partner used scissors. It was really fun and cool.
There aren't any pictures in this one because Mom was with Ian at the dissection. The engineering was a tour, not a lab. First, we went over to where they displayed some of the things that students had made for competitions. There was a cement canoe that floated! There were also some models of airplanes. After learning about those things, we went to a different building and learned about some of the experiments that they were working on. Then, they had one of the kids with us put on some waders and get into a small pit with sand in it. Then, they put water in the pit. It gushed all over and swallowed up the kid's feet! Then, it settled again. He was able to pull his feet out of the sand. Then, they put water in it again. It did the same thing, but this time the boy couldn't pull his feet out! They had to pull him out of the sand that time. It was interesting and fun too!
The robotics lab was really cool! First, they let us watch a RoboCart that we could control with our movements! It was great! Next we got to see a scanner that was hooked up to a tiny computer that could tell a blind person how to find items on a shelf. First you would scan an item, and then the computer would tell you where the item that you wanted was in relation to the one you had scanned. There was also a small black robot that rolled on a black line. It was made to sense where the black line was, because the black line was on a white piece of paper. The last robot was one that could tell you where you were with sensing pads. It was on a walker. The robot lab was one of our favorites. (See video for demonstrations.)
The last class was Physics. We always look forward to it. In the picture, Professor Coburn is putting liquid nitrogen into a cup. Liquid nitrogen is very, very cold. He had some balloons that he put into the nitrogen. They shrunk because the air turned into liquid and the air molecules were not bouncing into each other. One of the balloons didn't shrink. It was because it had helium in it, but it didn't float because it was long and skinny and that shape doesn't float in the air (it is the orange balloon in the picture). He also did cool things with lights. We had been given little plastic squares that could show rainbows if we looked at the light. It was really cool. We all liked his bead demonstration. He had a full container of plastic bead necklaces all strung together, and he showed us that if you pull a small length of the string, it all would start racing out. It only took a little bit of time for all of the beads to come out of the container. He also showed us that when you lifted the bead container high, they would come out fast, but if it was low, it would come out slowly. It was very fun.
Here is a video showing some of the activities in which we participated. Warning: Anatomy dissection may be disturbing to those who don't like to see blood.
Entomology Lab Tour
~by Megan & Ian
The first class we went to was about insects. First, we got to look at the many boxes of pinned insects. One of them looked like a box of pins, but when you looked closer, you could see tiny wasps that were about the size of the head of the pin. The many varieties of butterflies they had were very pretty. After looking at them, we all sat down and the teacher told us about insects and answered our questions. Afterwards, we looked at the insects again. They even had a live tarantula in the lab, but a tarantula is not an insect. It is an arachnid. All of the insects were very cool. They even had a huge Goliath beetle!~by Megan & Ian
Anatomy Lab Dissection
~by Ian
~by Ian
The next class I went to was dissecting a pig's heart and lungs. Dr. Anderson told us about what we were going to do before we did it. Then, one of his students told us about the different parts we would be cutting and feeling. We put on aprons and gloves. First, we cut the heart. Then, we looked inside it and put our fingers in the holes. We got to feel its heart strings. They were so strong that you could hold the heart up by them. Next, we cut and looked at how the blood went through. After we were done with the heart we did the lungs. We cut through the part where the air goes down. At the end there were two holes that went down to each lung. Then, we got to carry it over to the sink and we got to push the air in with the air hose and the lungs blew up like a balloon. I think the flap closed on one of the lungs because it stayed up like a balloon, so when we got back to our table, we popped it. I used my fist and my partner used scissors. It was really fun and cool.
Engineering
~by Megan
~by Megan
There aren't any pictures in this one because Mom was with Ian at the dissection. The engineering was a tour, not a lab. First, we went over to where they displayed some of the things that students had made for competitions. There was a cement canoe that floated! There were also some models of airplanes. After learning about those things, we went to a different building and learned about some of the experiments that they were working on. Then, they had one of the kids with us put on some waders and get into a small pit with sand in it. Then, they put water in the pit. It gushed all over and swallowed up the kid's feet! Then, it settled again. He was able to pull his feet out of the sand. Then, they put water in it again. It did the same thing, but this time the boy couldn't pull his feet out! They had to pull him out of the sand that time. It was interesting and fun too!
Robotics Lab
~by Megan & Ian
~by Megan & Ian
The robotics lab was really cool! First, they let us watch a RoboCart that we could control with our movements! It was great! Next we got to see a scanner that was hooked up to a tiny computer that could tell a blind person how to find items on a shelf. First you would scan an item, and then the computer would tell you where the item that you wanted was in relation to the one you had scanned. There was also a small black robot that rolled on a black line. It was made to sense where the black line was, because the black line was on a white piece of paper. The last robot was one that could tell you where you were with sensing pads. It was on a walker. The robot lab was one of our favorites. (See video for demonstrations.)
Physics Demonstrations
~by Megan & Ian
~by Megan & Ian
The last class was Physics. We always look forward to it. In the picture, Professor Coburn is putting liquid nitrogen into a cup. Liquid nitrogen is very, very cold. He had some balloons that he put into the nitrogen. They shrunk because the air turned into liquid and the air molecules were not bouncing into each other. One of the balloons didn't shrink. It was because it had helium in it, but it didn't float because it was long and skinny and that shape doesn't float in the air (it is the orange balloon in the picture). He also did cool things with lights. We had been given little plastic squares that could show rainbows if we looked at the light. It was really cool. We all liked his bead demonstration. He had a full container of plastic bead necklaces all strung together, and he showed us that if you pull a small length of the string, it all would start racing out. It only took a little bit of time for all of the beads to come out of the container. He also showed us that when you lifted the bead container high, they would come out fast, but if it was low, it would come out slowly. It was very fun.Here is a video showing some of the activities in which we participated. Warning: Anatomy dissection may be disturbing to those who don't like to see blood.
2 comments:
Wow, these events are neat. What an experience!
Megan,
I am impressed that you can spell engineering correctly. I couldn't spell it until Brad decided to major in it. But it looks like you guys had a lot of fun!
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