Mad scientists

I got to witness the Mad Science franchise at work today at Rachel's birthday party. The kids were enthralled and Rachel was one happy birthday girl! A great success.

Anselm has also been doing Mad Science in the afternoons. In general I like the idea, of course, of kids getting excited by science, but I do have my misgivings about this approach. There's a tremendous amount of stuff that comes home, much of which languishes around the house. The party version of course is more like a magic show than a lesson so it would be interesting to hear the presentation in the afternoon sessions; really, I should make a point of going along before the quarter ends. Today's presenter gave the kids little chance to build any understanding or deductive predictions, but she probably should not be taken as typical of the skills of the staff. There was a weird concentration on properties of polymers-- how much water a diaper absorbs, making slime-- without giving much sense of what is remarkable and what was going on. To me, the central science party themes are: electricity, pressure, energy/explosions, liquid nitrogen (she did get a lot of mileage out of a block of frozen CO2). Also, it's just got to be funny. The original Questacon Science Circus--the brilliant and hilarious Stuart Kohlhagen, John Close, Joe Grotowski and crew-- will forever be my model.