Many of the mishaps in folktales could be remedied if the protagonists knew some scientific principles.
STEM books and activities for fun
by Lois Wickstrom The Mysterious History of Invisible Magic Wands A magic wand focuses a magician’s power. While magic wands can be very useful, they have their drawbacks. If people see you carrying a magic wand, they often stop you and ask, “Are you a magician? Will you do some magic, right now?” This can be embarrassing and bothersome. So, Merlin invented the Invisible Magic Wand. And he passed the skill on to his apprentices, who continue to make them in their secret Celtic caves. They have covered the entrance to their caves with invisible curtains so they will not be disturbed in their work. How Invisible is an Invisible Magic Wand? Not only is this magic wand invisible, you don’t even have to carry it with you. You can summon it whenever you need it, so it won’t take up room in your pocket or purse. Just name your invisible magic wand. Don’t name it right away. Hold your invisible magic wand in your hands and get to know it for a few days – the right name will occur to you. Then think the words Atratya and the name of your wand . One invisible magic wand will last you forever. It is impossible to lose it. No matter where it is, it will come when you call. You can even use it to summon items that are really missing, like keys. What Can Your Invisible Magic Wand Do? Magic wands make things appear or disappear. They restore things or situations, help with an escape, make things float, and do many other things that would be normally be impossible. A favorite use is concentrating time. If you use your Invisible Magic Wand to concentrate time, you can finish tasks you don’t want to do (like your homework, or washing the dishes) and still have time to do the things you enjoy. How to Unpack Your Invisible Magic Wand First, you must unpack your wand from this envelope. Your wand has been compressed to fit into this envelope. Reach all the way to the bottom of the envelope, pull it out, and stretch it to your desired length. It will retain that shape. You can put it on your dresser where it will get light from your window, or you can put it in your sock drawer. Invisible Magic Wands remain invisible in light or dark. What Can’t Your Invisible Magic Wand Do? Your Invisible Magic Wand cannot make your parents, teachers or siblings disappear. It cannot make a bad report card disappear, (but if you use the time concentration mentioned above to do your homework, you won’t get bad report cards.) Your Invisible Magic Wand cannot be used to do anything to somebody else that you would not want done to you. It cannot be used to do anything you would feel guilty about later. Your Invisible Magic Wand can read your mind and you will not be able to fool it. How to Use Your Invisible Magic Wand When you are ready to use your Invisible Magic Wand, any grip a conductor would use to hold a baton to conduct the orchestra will be secure enough for your Invisible Magic Wand. Working magic is much like conducting mystical music. Just as an orchestra requires many musicians, working magic often requires cooperation of many factors. Your Invisible Magic Wand will bring you the help you need. Remember to treat your wand like a friend and it will be ready to serve you whenever you wish. How to Give an Invisible Magic Wand to a Friend ImagenieScienceAndMagic.com is the place to get Invisible Magic Wands. Or visit Merlin in his Celtic Cave and pick one up at the original source. Get a free Invisible Magic Wand. Send an email to [email protected]
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by Lois Wickstrom
When she was 14, my older daughter said, "The other kids get paid for their grades. It's not fair that you won’t pay for mine." I have rules for things I pay for. I pay for services that are of no benefit to the person performing them, but are important for my quality of life, such as paying the plumber to fix my leaky faucet. I pay for things I want and need, like groceries or new shoes. I pay for entertainment, such as movie tickets or concert tickets. When I pay for professional entertainment. I know that performing is fun for the entertainers, whether or not I’m there. I pay for the privilege of being there. I know I’m paying them for far more than inborn talent. I’m paying them for the years of education, training and practice that make them truly worth listening to or watching. I am paying so I may benefit from their performance. I send my children to school for their benefit. Their grades are their teachers’ way of telling them they did a good job. They have learned skills they need to improve the quality of their lives. They do not learn for my benefit. I pay taxes for their education. I provide them a quiet place to study. I help them if they have problems or questions. I praise them when they master a new skill, or tell me their thoughts on a new subject. I engage with them on their newfound interests. These are the real benefits of education. When my child asks me to pay her for her grades, she is responding to peer pressure. I will never encourage my child to give in to peer pressure. I don’t buy her a candy bar at the grocery store check-out. I don’t care if all the other moms in the line are buying them. When she asks to be paid for her grades, I’m aware she is also asking for more money. She knows she can babysit or mow lawns for more money. She will be providing a service that is of no benefit to her, but is of use to the person paying her. This is also something I want her to learn. I had a thought after I wrote this: If grades really matter to the parents, they need to pay the child to do their homework, daily. No child will wait over 4 months for a paycheck. So, at a minimum of 2 hours of homework a day, and a reasonable minimum wage of $15 an hour, that's $30 per day, or about $3000 per semester, plus a bonus if the grades are good. Again, if the parents really want good grades, they will hire a tutor. And since this child is only doing the work to get money, the child will also hit up the tutor for an additional hourly wage. Thus, the parents need to pay the tutor a skill level fee of $30 an hour, plus, extra to bribe the child. We're now up to $10,000 per semester, plus the end-of-semester Grade Bonus. Since most parents don't want to pay that much money, what they are really doing is telling their children, learning has no inherent value, and then paying the good students a pittance for being good students. by Lois Wickstrom
Children discover the world around them when they play. They discover in nature what they will later learn to call science. My stories grow from this joyous approach to life. I was lucky. I grew up in a college town. When I found an interesting rock, there was somebody I could bring it to with my questions. I remember finding a geode – a rock with crystals inside. I took it to the college where a professor told me that my rock come from a river about 30 miles away. Somebody had brought it to our town and abandoned it. Now, it was my treasure. The college had a rock collection from around the world. I joined a rock hunting club that drove out on weekends to explore wild locations in mountains and at lakes, and learned about rocks form in different kinds of places, and look different because of how they form. One of the rocks I found was called magnetite. Metal things stuck to it. Not all metal things, but some metal things. I became fascinated by magnets. That led to the study of electricity. Every new discovery led to more ideas, more places to go, experiments to try, things to learn. In college I studied biology and chemistry. I collected bacteria from everywhere. I discovered that toilet seats have very few bacteria, but the floor in front of the hand drier had the best collection on campus. I learned to use a microscope. I discovered that colored pictures in magazines are made of tiny dots of ink. I also saw that life – tiny cells – are infinitely enlargeable. The more I increased the magnification, the more new details appeared. In chemistry class, I learned what happens at the molecular level when we cook. Why do bubbles form when we boil water? The water is changing into steam. Steam is a gas. Gases form bubbles in water. Why do bubbles form when we add lemon juice and baking soda to cookie dough? That’s a chemical reaction releasing bubbles of carbon dioxide – the same gas that our bodies make from the oxygen we breathe. In my yard, I watched grasshoppers hop, fireflies light up, butterflies work their way out of cocoons. Adults knew what fascinated me and would show me a new flower that came up in their yard, or the new kittens their cat was nursing. I was lucky to have adults around who knew how to help me discover the things and ideas that fascinate me. Now, I’m an adult, and I want to pass on this excitement for today’s children. Science is an adventurous way to explore the world. by Lois Wickstrom
Making a Hole in an Ice Cube Ice cubes are solid. Ice is frozen water. Water is frozen in the freezer, but liquid at room temperature. That’s why you get liquid water out of your sink faucet, and not a frozen stream like an icicle. If you leave an ice cube at room temperature it will melt and become liquid water again. But sometimes we want to melt ice quickly. There are three ways to melt ice: pressure, salt, and heat. Pressure: You could put a long thin weight on top of an ice cube. The weight would put pressure on the ice and melt it. But, while the weight is doing its melting work, the warm air in the room is also melting the ice cube from all around the outside edges. The ice cube will be small by the time the weight works its way through to the bottom of the cube. Salt: You could shake salt on the ice cube. Each grain of salt will eat a tiny ditch in the ice cube. Once you can no longer see the grain of salt in the ditch, you can add another grain of salt and let the ice melt again. Repeat this process with another grain of salt in the ditch each time the ice melts the ditch a little deeper, you will get a hole. As in the pressure example, the warm air in the room will be melting the entire outside of the ice cube, so the ice cube will be much smaller when you finally melt a hole through it. Heat: You could place one end of a drinking straw on the ice cube, and blow into it. Keep breathing and blowing. Your breath is warm because your body is warm. You’ll be surprised how quickly you can blow a hole in the ice cube. Can you think of other ways to use heat to make a hole in the ice cube? Children discover the world around them when they play. They discover in nature what they will later learn to call science. Our books at http://www.LookUnderRocks.com feed this joyous approach to life. by Lois Wickstrom
Before you get in the tub, notice how high the water comes up the edge of the tub. The height of the water is called the water level. Every body of water has a water level. Water in a well, water in a lake, water in the sink, or water in the ocean. The water level is a measure of how full the container is. Water in the tub has to be high enough that you can take a bath, but not too high. If the water is too high in the tub it will over flow the sides of the tub and slosh onto the floor when you get in. In other words, it will splash and make a mess. What is happening? Why does water make a mess so easily? Several things are happening here. 1) the water takes up room in your tub. 2) your body takes up room in your tub. 3) there is only so much room in your tub. If you put in too much stuff, it will be more than the tub can hold. The tub doesn’t care what stays and what goes. It can only hold so much and something has to leave. 4) your body is more dense than the water. It sinks to the bottom and pushes the water up. If the side of the tub is too low to contain both your body and the water, something has to get out of the tub. 5) Your body has a shape of its own. Water doesn’t. Water is a liquid. Liquids take the shape of their containers. Water in a drinking glass takes the shape of the glass. Water in a box takes the shape of the box. Water in a tub, takes the shape of the tub with rounded corners and straight sides. Water on the floor doesn’t have sides to make it hold a shape. Because water can change shape, it is easy for the water to flow over the edge of the tub and onto the floor. 6) Less dense things rise to the top. You’ve seen an ice cube float. Ice cubes are less dense than water. Your body is more dense than water, so it sinks to the bottom of the tub, pushing the water up. If water were more dense than your body, then it would sink, and you would float. You would flow out of the tub. You can do the same thing when you wash dishes. If the water in the sink is too high, and you put dishes in the sink to soak, the water will flow over the edge of the sink and onto the floor. You can fill a glass with water and then drop in pennies. See how many pennies you can add before water flows over the top of the glass. Pennies are more dense than water. Some things are less dense than water. See how much water you can add to a glass of water with an ice cube before the ice cube tumbles out. Pour a thin layer of oil into a glass. Add water. See that the oil floats on top of the water. How much water you can add to the glass before the oil flows over the top? (Do this in a sink to catch the mess.) Children discover the world around them when they play. They discover in nature what they will later learn to call science. Our books at http://www.LookUnderRocks.com feed this joyous approach to life. Starlings are most famous for their dancing air formations involving huge flocks of thousands or even a million of the tiny iridescent birds. These shifting, swirling cloud-like dances are called murmurations. To avoid collisions, each bird must keep watch on the seven nearest starlings, and be alert to avoid attacks from hawks and eagles. If an enemy is spotted, the entire dance shifts to avoid being eaten.
Starlings most often form murmurations in November and December. Starlings were brought to the United States from the British Isles in 1890. Eugene Schieffelin, was a member of the American Acclimatization Society, which imported many creatures from around the world into North America. Mr. Schieffelin loved Shakespeare’s plays. He decided to bring all the birds from Shakespeare’s plays to Central Park in New York City. Starlings are mentioned in Henry IV, part 1, scene 3. He imported 60 starlings. 32 of the starlings took shelter under the eaves of the American Museum of Natural History, and survived. They soon spread all across the United States and Canada. 1) Find out if starlings fly near you. Here’s a map of where starlings fly in the British Isles: http://www.starlingsintheuk.co.uk/roost-map.html And here’s a map of where they fly in the United States. http://www.sibleyguides.com/2010/11/questions-about-starling-migration/ Starlings were originally brought to Central Park in New York City, but they are most often seen on the west coast. They fly more frequently throughout the year at low elevations such as in the state of Washington. 2) Watch out for bird poop. While the birds fly, they poop. Normally bird poop is healthy for plants, but a flock of a million starlings can drop bird poop a foot deep, which can kill plants. People don’t like to have birds’ poop fall on them, either. If you want to enjoy watching starlings, it’s handy to bring an umbrella to protect yourself. 3) Because starlings can destroy crops, it’s important to look for their nests. Starlings love trees with lots of branches that hide them from predators. If you see starlings nesting in a tree near farmland, be sure to tell the owner to thin the branches. 4) Starlings also roost in abandoned buildings. Since bird poop is difficult to clean off bricks, it’s a good idea to remove the nests when you find them. Starlings can nest anywhere, so they’ll keep moving until they find a place that is safe from predators and humans who move their nests. They will still fly in their beautiful murmurations. Enjoy the murmurations, but protect yourself and nearby crops from their poop. This tip sheet is by Lois Wickstrom, author of Carrie’s Flight, coming this March from Look Under Rocks press. |
Lois Wickstrom
former head science teacher at Science in the City Summer Camp. Now writing STEM fiction and non-fiction Archives
March 2022
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