Energy... lots of Energy...

We survived day one of field trips! 


The Energy Day at MLHS was pretty good.  I saw all three of my cousins that go to school in Northrup.  Lunch from McDonald's was tasty. 


Our school was split up into sectionals by grades; I tagged along with the 6th graders.  We played with toys to figure out what kind of energy was stored and what kind of work it did.  Then we made windmills that could lift a paper cup filled with washers.  Pretty cool.  The 6th graders weren't too impressed.


The 5th graders did an experiment involving dropping a ball from a certain height and counting the seeds that fell out of the dish (to see how much energy had been used).  They thought our windmills were the coolest (Can we make some?  Do we get to do that?). 


The 8th graders said their speaker was the most boring thing ever, but their experiment was kind of fun.  They built a mini-engine with a pop bottle.  Then they did something with static electricity.  Whatever it was, the end result looked pretty cool.


After lunch we played games with the high schoolers: ninja, poison dart frog, and another game that had to do with colors and jumping and flopping on the ground.  I'd heard of the first two games before, but that last one was new to me.  Everyone starts out lying on the floor.  The people in the middle pick a color (yellow) and call out random words.  If the people lying on the floor get up or move when the middle people didn't say yellow, they're out.  When they do finally call yellow, you get to your feet, put your hands in a shark fin above your head, and hope you're not the last person.  If you are last, you're out.


A teacher from MLHS did a session to wrap up the whole day.  He had one of those static ball things that make your hair stand on end.  He put on a mini-play thing involving Star Wars, gas to make your voice deeper, static electricity/pie tins/popcorn kernels, and a light bulb that lit up like a light saber when you touched it to the ball.  My students thought he was going to shatter the bulb on them. 


We made it back to school with plenty of time for recess.  The dads supervised with Mrs. E while I helped a 5th grader make up her late science lab. 


Now I need to book it back to Courtland to deposit our last Camp Omega checks before the bank closes!