May 7, 2008

A Hoosier Win at the Science Fair!

Brandt Callahan and Jackson Bartlett, who go to Parkview Intermediate School in Bedford, Indiana, took the Experiment of the Week and won FIRST PRIZE in the third grade division of the Science Fair!

In fact, Brandt and Jackson added a little OOMPH to the experiment by using several different kinds of cereal instead of just one, and using a blender instead of a baggie and their hands. The boys admit that most of the cereals they used just didn’t seem to have any iron in them, in spite of what their labels claimed.

Next time, they’re going to use Life cereal, because they want to SEE the little black dots of iron! They've also decided that there definitely won't be any raisins involved - the ICK factor was just too high with raisins.

Brandt and Jackson are in the third grade, and they learned about this experiment from their teacher. Jackson had won First Prize in first grade, and

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September 13, 2007

Ellen DeGeneres Wants Giant Smoke Rings!

It's official... I'm flying out to be a guest on the Ellen DeGeneres Show next week. Back in April of 2006 when a producer on the show originally contacted our office, I asked for your suggestions on experiments to do with Ellen. Lots of people suggested my Smoke Rings demo and Ellen might have taken your suggestion (hint, hint). Let's just say that our office was filled with lots of smoke today as someone practiced shooting cups off of everyone's head. We're told that the air date will be next Friday, September 21, 2007. More to come.

July 11, 2007

Geyser Tube Toy Helps Set New Mentos Geyser World Record

Dropping a roll of Mentos into a bottle of soda used to be something that kids did for fun. Now adults are getting into the act. I opened my e-mail and received these cool pictures from the organizers of the event that took place on July 10th in Flower Mound, TX. Representatives from the Guinness World Records certified the record-setting effort, which went off at 6:30 pm inside the Circle R Ranch Rodeo Arena where 850 independent sales representatives from Books Are Fun, a Reader's Digest Company, simultaneously dropped Mentos into 850 two-liter bottles of soda using the Geyser Tube Toy. The previous Mentos geyser record was set on May 24, 2007 in Cincinnati, Ohio when 504 Mentos-and-Coke geysers were set off. Watch the Video: The Largest Number of Simultaneous Mentos Geysers Please remember that you're looking at 850 screaming adults... not kids... running away. Yes, learning is fun for people of all ages.

July 11, 2007

Exploding Watermelons

I love Halloween. One of my favorite activities is to "carve" pumpkins using a simple reation inside the fruit. First, you carve the face then carefully replace pieces. After creating a reaction by generating a gas inside and igniting it (ask your local chemistry teacher for the details) the face pieces are blown off with a small explosion. Halloween is more than 100 days away and I just couldn't wait. So I initiated the new weather anchor at the local Denver television station by introducing her to carving watermelons. The problem was, we didn't really carve the watermelon, it exploded. Watch the Video to see how we skipped right over the carving and went straight to exploding.

July 8, 2007

Young Magicians Take Center Stage

Okay, it's not science... but I'm so proud that I just had to share it. Mark and Scott are our twin 5 year old boys who have both taken a liking to magic. It probably doesn't hurt to see their brother Jack (who is now 8 years old) performing his magic tricks on stage. I was recently invited to be a featured speaker at the SPLASH Summer Conference presented by Frog Street Press in Dallas, Texas. Mark and Scott performed this trick on stage in front of almost 1,700 teachers and they had a ball. The boys couldn't understand why everyone was getting up to leave at the end of their trick. You'll see why. http://www.youtube.com/v/3gA1dWQQpgc