party
Science is Evrywhere: Even on this Page!
By Ken Fink
A woman sits down at a restaurant table, looks at the menu and says, "Waiter,
there's soup on the menu." The waiter peers closer and wipes it off. Like the
classic joke, it's our turn to say: "Waiter, there's science on this page!"
Science, in its most welcome form, is the unexpected; the stuff wiped off the
menu, not just written on it. There's science on this page - enough to fill
textbooks and even entire careers! It's just a matter of looking closer.
Fool your eyes
Go ahead - get closer to this magazine. What do you see? White paper? Black
text? Colorful photos? Look closer and you'll see that most of the photo doesn't
exist. It was printed with only four colors!
The printer is taking advantage of us! How? Our eyes work well, but they have
limitations. It turns out that our eyes and brain smooth out the world a bit.
When tiny details are too close together, our eyes simply average them out: A
black dot and white dot packed closely together appear grey.
Exploiting these limitations allows us to create complex images with nothing
but dots. Look at a TV with a magnifying glass, and you'll see a screen full of
dots. Look at a "high-definition" TV and you'll see similar dots packed closer
together. Step away from the screen and the dots mush together in your vision to
become the image you were meant to see.
This works with colors too! You've probably mixed pigments to make new
colors; it's a favorite activity of painters young and old. Each color of paint
takes away (absorbs) certain colors of light, letting the "right" colors pass
through or reflect to your eyes. If you mix paints together, each paint absorbs
certain colors and what's left is the color you want your audience to see.
Printers don't mix, you do
Think of how many thousands of colors you find in this magazine. It's
beautiful! But it would be very difficult for printers to mix inks for each
different color on the page. Instead, they use the same trick they use for
making grey. If you want "light blue" just use tiny dots of blue ink, spaced so
your eye sees light blue. To make it darker, put more dots in the same space. To
make purple, layer blue dots with red dots. Most printers, including this
magazine, only use four colors of ink: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black. In fact
the yellow ink in this paragraph is so light that we added some black dots to
darken it. Grab a magnifying glass to see for yourself!
Science is not a textbook
Our company, Wondergy, creates parties and events that use explorations like
this to engender curiosity. We bring really cool stuff to birthday parties,
schools, scouts, and even the mall! At our events, kids will often spontaneously
shout that they love science and we will usually ask what their last experiment
was. The most common response sounds something like this: "Last week, in school,
we made a volcano." Well, yes, but what about something more recent? What about
shooting hoops or skateboarding before school (physics)? Playing with your food
at lunch (chemistry)? Bothering the teacher during class (psychology)? Weren't
those experiments too? Science is not just in the textbook that weighs down your
backpack. Science is everywhere, and science is what makes things worth a closer
look.
In May we started offering a program called SkateScience, where we bring a
professional skateboarder to show off his aerial tricks. I love to start the
show by asking if they think this is a science assembly; kids inevitably say
"no, it's about skateboarding." By the end, I ask the same question and the most
common answer I've heard is "Both!" Game, set, match.
Every party is a science party
I encourage everyone to have a science party, but it doesn't need to look
like science. Save the beakers and lab coats, and encourage your guests to
explore the fascinating hidden world of whatever they're doing. There's science
in magic. There's science in bowling. There's science in a princess party.
There's even science in pizza! And it's awesome.
Looking closer at everything brings a new power and beauty to your view of
the world. Kids start out life seeing themselves surrounded by experiments. Can
I stand? Walk? Will it taste good? Will mom react to this? Is it repeatable?
Even for parents and teachers, our world is still full of experiments. We
somehow get taught to think of subjects as relegated into textbooks and class
periods, but they're not. There is no wrong time to explore our world.
Please encourage that worldview in your family, teachers, and your party
guests - it's contagious (biology).
Wondergy is a science entertainment company that proves that education and
fun aren't opposites - they go hand-in-hand! By listening to our audience, our
scientists make each event unique and special; no two shows are alike.
Wondergy's interactive shows bring the thrill of science to community events,
camps, birthday parties, and more!
Coming Soon: Wondergy is bringing science to the Montgomery Mall! To have
your science party in our new science space, or to invite us to your home,
please call toll-free at 86-MOLECULE (866) 653-2853 or visit
Wondergy.com.
Home
About us
.png)
