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The Kid Should See This

Pendulum Snake DIY, a Build Your Own Exploratorium demo

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The Pendulum Snake exhibit blends art and science into a mesmerizing visual display of physics and time—a swinging series of pendulums that reveals a remarkable pattern found in nature.

Learn how to make your own pendulum snake with metal weights and PVC pipe. Exploratorium Senior Scientist Julie Yu shares the instructions for this easy DIY wave project. She also demonstrates the pendulum snake exhibit at the museum.

The project is just one of the Exploratorium’s huge library of Science Snacks, “hands-on, teacher-tested activities that bring explorations of natural phenomena into the classroom and home.”

diy pendulum wave

Each activity uses inexpensive, easily-available materials, offers detailed instructions and images, provides a clear explanation of what’s going on, and is adaptable to a wide range of curricula, content areas, grade levels, and settings.

Pendulum Snake is also one in a series of Build Your Own Exploratium videos that are on their YouTube channel.

swinging pendulum exhibit
Watch these Exploratorium-related videos next:
Speed up geologic time with a DIY squeeze box 
Curious Contraptions by automata artist Paul Spooner
The Golden Rain Experiment: Turning lead into ‘gold’ lead
• How to collect black sand with a magnet

Bonus pendulum videos on TKSST include:
• A pendulum wave demonstration with bowling balls
• Chaotic Pendulum, a DIY physics demonstration
• Nowhere and Everywhere at the Same Time, No. 2

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