(Em)Powered by Girls!

Today I heard a catchy tune on the radio.

It was "Anything" by Hedley.

I really liked how it made me feel that "I can do anything!"

But lets be real. Do we all feel like we can do anything? Do we always brush away the roles and expectations installed on us by society?

I always remind myself that my two girls grow up in a society that puts lots of barriers for women to choose their profession. I've already addressed this in a recent post http://thinkingscientific.blogspot.ca/2014/06/supporting-girls-through-their.html

Luckily for me, during the summer while running the Pueblo Science Summer Camp, I took my campers to visit the Toronto Tool Library. An amazing DIY maker space with lots of machines from woodworking to 3D printing to electronics. Absolutely AWESOME!
But the thing that really stood out in my view was the fact that the person that showed us the space and later delivered a short program for us was a WOMAN!!! (Michelle is the name)

Here I am preaching to everyone that women should have an equal opportunity to pursue professions which are traditionally considered to be "jobs for men", and I act surprised to see a women doing just that. What does that say about me? For me it tells me that I've been predisposed to be surprised to see women doing "man jobs".

HOW TO ESCAPE?

HOW TO CHANGE THE WAY WE THINK?

My answer to that is - more female role models. and Michelle is just that. By doing the stuff she does, by being the person I would like to see other girls seeing as a NORMAL choice for themselves, she is making a difference. And the more Michelles we have, the more obvious and normal it will be.

So when I mentioned that to Michelle, she said she shares these feelings and she is going to do something about that. And she did! She came up with a program called "Powered by Girls"

"Eight weeks dedicated to inspiring girls to explore, create, make, and do! With supervised access to a laser cutter, 3D printer, woodworking shop, and over 2,000 tools, girls will engage in a variety of workshops designed to fuel their confidence and ingenuity! Workshops will include introduction to coding, a spooky Tesla radio (for Halloween), 3D modelling, and more!"

What more can I say?

Power to the Girls! You have the power! and now you can have the Tool!

So if you come across these programs, don't keep it to yourselves. Talk about them. Share with others. Share with boys, share with girls. Let everyone know that Girls can do ANYTHING!

Science Fair at the Science Camp

Wow, it is sooooo hot and humid these days in Toronto.

And like every summer, Toronto is bustling with tourists.
But more than that, Toronto is a popular place for people from all over the world to come and improve their English skills, while soaking up sun and sites of this gorgeous place.

How does that have anything to do with science?
Well, as it happens, this last Saturday, as part of the Pueblo Science experience, we held a "Science Fair" event for the CISS ESL camp at St. Michael's University.

We had a GREAT time!!!!

We had:

Balloons pushed into Liquid Nitrogen

What you see:
When an inflated balloon is pushed into liquid nitrogen it shrinks.
When taking it out of the liquid nitrogen, it expands back to its former size.

Why does that happen?
That's because the trapped air inside shrinks when the temperatures drop, and expands when the temperature increases.
The pressure inside is always constant at 1atm, same as in the atmosphere.
The amount of air molecules which are mainly nitrogen molecules and oxygen molecules is kept fixed because the balloon is closed tight.
The only two variables left to be changed are the temperature (liquid nitrogen is at -196 centigrade!) and the volume.
The relation between all these attributes (pressure, volume, amount and temperature) is called:
The Ideal Gas Law, which is P*V = n*R*T
(P is the pressure,
V is the volume
n is the amount of molecules
T is the temperature
and R is a constant that relates all of the above to one another and is called not surprisingly - the gas constant) 

 

We also had:

The Disappearing Vial

 What you see:

When you submerge a glass vial into a glass filled with oil, the vial becomes invisible!!!!!!

Why does this happen?

The reason we can see things is because light hits them, bounces back, and hits our eyes.

But the medium around the object also plays a role.

For instance, we look at a coin on the table, it is easy to see it and grab it.

But when the coin is in a pool of water, we see it, but have a herder time grabbing it.

This is because the water bends the light as it penetrates it. This bending of light is called REFRACTION, and the extent by which light is refracted is called "Refractive Index"

When light passed from one medium (say water) to another medium (say glass) the light will bend if the refractive indexes are not the same. 

BUT, if the refractive indexes are the same (like in our case with oil and glass), then light passes through without bending (or, refracting) going straight through. This makes the glass appear invisible!

 

 

 And also:

Non-Newtonian Fluid

 What you see:
When you mix corn starch and water, you get a gooey mixture (very slimy).
When you push your finger in it slowly, it goes all the way in.
When you pound it hard and fast, it cannot penetrate. The mixture appears 'solid'.

Why does that happen?
Newton was able to formulate how fluids behave by stating that when you apply a force on them, the fluid will flow. But like all motion, fluids experience "friction" which is referred to as viscosity.
What Newton saw was that viscosity was constant of the material, and only changed with temperature.
However, some fluids (like our corn starch) behave differently. (therefore the term - "non-Newtonian")
Our stuff 'solidifies' with strong force, meaning its viscosity increases with force.
When the force is weak, the viscosity is lower.

There were a few more activities, but I think this post is long enough.
I'll continue this another time.
Stay tuned....