The Kid Should See This.
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There's just so much science, nature, music, art, technology, storytelling and assorted good stuff out there that my kids (and maybe your kids) haven't seen. It's most likely not stuff that was made for them...
But we don't underestimate kids around here.
Kid-friendly not-made-for-kids videos for all! Collected by Rion Nakaya and her three four year old co-curator.
Tip Jar: Curating this blog takes work! If you like the videos on this site, please support the science education projects that we've picked on DonorsChoose.org.
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Google’s The Story of Send visualizes how an email journeys through their data centers to reach its final destination, all while promoting the energy efficiency of their custom-built servers and their support of clean energy along the way.
I wish they’d gone into a bit more technical detail, but it’s a nice introduction to how much more there is to email technology than what we see, and provides some inspiration in the idea that a large company can innovate its business while still committing to carbon-neutrality.
via Neatorama.
We’ve watched this video quite a few times in the last few weeks… it’s surfaced as a kiddo-favorite. Not only is it a beautiful animation (by Toronto-based Smart Bubble Society, “a not-for-profit motion graphic studio that promotes social justice, self-education and critical awareness”), but the piece tells the story of our recent history with fossil fuels, and then names some cleaner solutions (wind and solar energy, for example) to the challenges that we face on the energy and climate change fronts.
Want more solutions to reducing oil consumption? There are some here and here — many that kids can help with.
We love when kids take science and the art of making into their own hands. This kid made his own balloon-powered boat!
Related: Inexpensive balloon-powered boat kits found online and DIY Ideas on How to Make Balloon-Powered Vehicles!
Geysers are a rare phenomenon that exist in only a few places on the Earth. Some of the tallest are in New Zealand, Iceland, Geyser Valley in Russia, and Wyoming’s Yellowstone National Park. Yellowstone’s 500-ish geysers — a handful of which are shown in this video — are the product of the geothermal heat of a massive, ancient and active volcanic caldera (an exploded crater) that is a majority of the park.
Geysers such as Old Faithful are a type of geothermal feature that periodically erupt scalding hot water. Increased pressure exerted by the enormous weight of the overlying rock and water prevents deeper water from boiling. As the hot water rises it is under less pressure and steam bubbles form. They, in turn, expand on their ascent until the bubbles are too big and numerous to pass freely through constrictions. At a critical point the confined bubbles actually lift the water above, causing the geyser to splash or overflow. This decreases the pressure of the system and violent boiling results. Large quantities of water flash into tremendous amounts of steam that force a jet of water out of the vent: an eruption begins. Water (and heat) is expelled faster than the geyser’s recharge rate, gradually decreasing the system’s pressure and eventually ending the eruption.
Old Faithful, a cone geyser named in 1870, is called the most predictable in this geothermic process, erupting for 2.5 minutes every 91 minutes.
Our favorite: Beehive. Bonus: immediate rainbow sighting.
We love this video of Euler’s (sounds like Oiler’s) Spinning Disk, not only because of the physics behind how long it spins on the slightly concave mirror base, but also because of the intense, hypnotic sound it makes, especially toward the end.
Euler’s Disc was invented by Joseph Bendik in the 1980s, while he was working for an aerospace firm in California, and spinning coins on the cafeteria table. He named it after Leonhard Euler, a Swiss mathematician and physicist who lived from 1707 to 1783, and who did some of the pioneering work on spinning and rolling objects.
Want to watch it again? You can enjoy Euler’s Spinning Disk demonstrations both in French and with a British accent, too.
We’ve always loved the super tall wind-power turbines while speeding by on a train or in a car. Reaching tall into the sky, they are a marvel of sustainable kinetic power and so the kid often asks for videos of them…
This time-lapse video shows the assembly of three wind-power turbines within a two-day period in June 2011 at Puget Sound Energy’s Lower Snake River Wind Project-Phase I, located in Garfield County, Washington. From the ground to the tip of a vertical blade, the 2.3-megawatt turbines stand more than 430 feet tall and weigh 340 tons. The boom on the crane erecting the turbines extends 390 feet into the air. When completed in early 2012, PSE’s newest wind farm will have 149 turbines capable of generating 343 megawatts of electricity, enough to serve 100,000 households.
William Kamkwamba’s story is already out there as a book, a young readers book, a Kickstarter documentary film project, not only one but two TED Talks, and luckily for us, the six minute story in video form. A description of that story:
Enchanted by the workings of electricity as a boy, William had a goal to study science in Malawi’s top boarding schools. But in 2002, his country was stricken with a famine that left his family’s farm devastated and his parents destitute. Unable to pay the eighty-dollar-a-year tuition for his education, William was forced to drop out and help his family forage for food as thousands across the country starved and died.
Yet William refused to let go of his dreams. With nothing more than a fistful of cornmeal in his stomach, a small pile of once-forgotten science textbooks, and an armory of curiosity and determination, he embarked on a daring plan to bring his family a set of luxuries that only two percent of Malawians could afford and what the West considers a necessity—electricity and running water. Using scrap metal, tractor parts, and bicycle halves, William forged a crude yet operable windmill, an unlikely contraption and small miracle that eventually powered four lights, complete with homemade switches and a circuit breaker made from nails and wire. A second machine turned a water pump that could battle the drought and famine that loomed with every season.
Soon, news of William’s magetsi a mphepo—his “electric wind”—spread beyond the borders of his home, and the boy who was once called crazy became an inspiration to those around the world.
We love windmills and really love William’s drive and ingenuity. This is exactly what the kid should see.
Eske Rex’s Pendulum-Powered Drawing Machine immediately came to mind when I first saw Robert Howsare’s Drawing Apparatus. They both play off of the old spirograph-ish connection, however the pendulum-powered machine is fascinating because it’s using gravity (transferring back and forth between potential and kinetic energy) to power the drawing, vs. being motor-powered. Science + Art FTW!
Yes, you can build your own lightbulb! This is what you’ll need: Eight D-sized batteries, Mason jar or other clear glass, Electrical tape, Pie pan, Scissors, Toilet paper tube, Mechanical pencil refills, Small alligator clips and adult supervision. Now watch the video! Details here.
