Tech & Nature Challenge

This week we started the Canada 150 Challenge during Patrol Time and worked on the Quebec Tech & Nature Challenge for the remainder of the meeting.

We started off with 30 minutes of Patrol Time where each Patrol worked on their first set of chosen activities for the Canada 150 Challenge:

• Daffodil - Planned to start off with Beadwork (making beaded Canadian Flag Pins) but an incident with the beads ended this activity early; they then moved on to Puzzles & Quizzes (wordsearches, crosswords, mazes and fill-in puzzles about Canada)
• Trillium - Planned to start off with Beadwork (making beaded Canadian Flag Pins) but an incident with the beads ended this activity early; they then moved on to Canada-themed Games Great-Grandmother Played (Patrol games from the 1920s and 1930s)
• Pansy - Started out with Hockey Night in Canada (making sticks and a puck from paper and playing hockey with them), and then moved on to Northern Games (a series of Inuit games)
• Rose - Started with the 150 Challenge (getting active with 150), followed by the Trivia Challenge (Canadian trivia quizzes)

After cleaning up, we had our usual opening, followed by a game - Squirt.

Our first activity was Starburst Geology. Each Patrol was given 9 Starburst candies, tinfoil and wax paper and had to make up three packages of candies, numbered 1, 2 and 3. Package 1 was squished with their hands, package 2 was heated for 3 minutes and then squished, and package 3 was cooked for 10 minutes and left to cool until the end of the meeting.

We attempted to do a round-robin for the remaining four activities, but were unable to complete everything. The activities we worked on were:

Balloon Rockets (Physics)

For this activity, girls work in pairs. The straw is threaded onto the string. One girl holds one end of the string. The other girl brings the straw to her end of the string and inflates the balloon and tapes it onto the straw. When she lets it go, the force of the air moving out of the balloon will shoot the rocket along the string to the other end! The more you blow up the balloon, the faster and further it will go.

Floating Ball (Air Pressure)

Each girl cuts out a circle of paper and tapes it onto the short bendy end of a straw in a cone shape. Place a ball of foil inside the cone. Blow through the straw and watch the ball float!

Calculator Fun (Math/Technology)

We provided the girls with calculators, and they tried the Birth Date Detector and the Numbers to Words Flow Chart.

The Great Cookie Extraction (Mining)

This activity came from BC, and asked the girls to mine for chocolate chips while learning about resource extraction. 

We ended by unwrapping the Starburst rocks and talking briefly about how different types of rocks are formed. Package 1 represented sedimentary rocks (created by pressure), package 2 represented metamorphic rocks (created by pressure and heat), and package 3 represented igneous rocks (created through extreme heat).

To finish the meeting, the girls played a game with a bouncing ball, followed by reminders for Friday and Taps.

Downloads:

• Quebec Tech & Nature Challenge (GGC Quebec Council)
• Calculator Fun Sheet
• Cookie Mining Activity

Physics Day @ Mac

On Saturday, March 25th, 7 Caledonia Guides and 1 Lone Guide joined Guides from across the region for the annual Engineering Day for Girl Guides at McMaster University in Hamilton. The focus for this years event was the Guide Physics Badge.


Our presenters for the day were Glenne, Tom, Veronika, Geoff and Natalie, who are all currently studying Engineering at McMaster. We started the day by learning a bit about the four types of science (math, chemistry, biology and physics) and 9 broad categories of engineering (electrical, mechanical, civil, biomedical, chemical, computer, software, physics and materials).


Session 1: Colours & Light
In our first session, we learned about Colours and Light and each girl built a periscope.

Properties of Light

• Reflection - light bouncing off surfaces
• Refraction - the bending of light as it passes through one thing to another
• Speed of Light - the fastest known speed, 300 million metres/second - light can travel around the world nearly 8 times in one second!
• Dispersion - separation of visible (white) light into its different colours

Light travels via waves, while air stays in one place but vibrates. Wavelengths are the distance between two vibration peaks. Where there is a large distance between peaks, light appears more red, where there is a small distance between peaks,  light appears more purple (opposite ends of the visible spectrum - red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple). Amplitude refers to the height of the waves. The higher the wave, the brighter the light.

Periscopes allow a person to see around or over an object.


Session 2: Energy & Friction
Next, we learned about Newton's 3rd Law of Motion, Flight and Aerospace Engineering before building our own rockets!

Newton's 3rd Law of Motion: "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction."

About Flight

• Flight is how objects move through the air.
• How do things fly? By making use of opposing forces - thrust and drag, lift and weight.
• Air has mass, pressure and temperature.
• Buoyant Flight - objects float through the air using a gas that is lighter than air (i.e. heated air in a hot air balloon)
• Aerodynamic Flight - objects use wings to fly through the air
• Rockets use (1) engines and (2) changes in air pressure (air is heated and used to propel the rocket upwards)
• There are no air particles in space, so less energy is needed once the rocket leaves the atmosphere.
• The first aircraft was flown by the Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk in North Carolina on December 17, 1903. They traveled for 12 seconds, moving 120 feet.

Aerospace Engineers

• Study, design and test planes and rockets using their knowledge of math and physics
• Aeronautical Engineers design planes for use inside the Earth's atmosphere
• Astronautical Engineers design rockets for use in outer space.

Each girl then made their own elastic-propelled rocket!

After this session, we had a break for drinks and snacks, and the presenters played "Heads Up, Seven Up" with the girls.

Session 3: Forces 
Our final session of the day involved learning about Energy and building projectile launchers!

Energy

• There are two types of energy:
• Kinetic Energy - Energy that is in motion (i.e. water, wind)
• Potential Energy - Energy that is stored (i.e. spring, elastic band)
• Potential Energy can be further divided:
• Gravitational Potential Energy
• if an object is at an elevation, it has gravitational potential energy
• dropping the object results in kinetic energy
• the work done to create the potential energy is the act of raising the object
• Elastic Potential Energy
• usually converted into kinetic energy (i.e. when you stretch an elastic band)
• Chemical Potential Energy
• energy can be stored in different atoms and molecules
• atoms are building blocks, molecules are a chain of atoms stuck together
• energy comes from breaking down these molecules (i.e. batteries, human stomach, car engines)

This activity was the most challenging, but everyone managed to successfully make their own projectile launcher!
We ended the day by filling out evaluation and feedback forms and then headed home.

Downloads:

• Build a Periscope
• Build a Rocket
• Build a Projectile Launcher

Fall Frolic 2015 - STEM

On Saturday, October 3rd 6 Guides and 2 Guiders attended Fall Frolic 2015 at Camp Teka in Paris along with about 250 other Sparks, Brownies, Guides and their Guiders. Despite the cold, windy weather we had a great time and the rain held off until the final activity of the day and didn't become heavy until shortly before the parents arrived to pick up the girls.

After opening and flag raising, we headed to our first station - Compass Games. The girls learned about the 8 main points of the compass and played a number of different games. They started off with a game where if they had the item that was called out (i.e. blue eyes, a brother, like pizza) they had to run to a given point. Next they had a choice of different games. The ones chosen were Foxlease Ball, where the girls form a tight circle and have to move a ball from North to South (or any other set of directions) using only their feet. If the ball goes outside of their circle, they have to return to their starting point. Another game was to make as many words as possible using the letters in the word COMPASS, and the last game was compass drawings.

Our second stop was a craft. We talked about DNA and what it does, and then each girl made a beaded double helix of her own.

After a snack and a drink, we headed onto our third session - Wide Games. Here the girls were challenged to gather the supplies necessary to recreate a molecule to save the world! Lots of teamwork was needed in order to put gain all the items and put the molecule together correctly.

After lunch, we moved onto a Games session where the girls took part in a relay race to complete various challenges and earn puzzle pieces. Once they had gathered all the puzzle pieces, they had to work as a team to put it together.

Our next stop was the Music session, where we sang Tall Trees, McDonald's, My Name is Flo, and played the Norwegian Number game - linking each song to a part of STEM. The girls also made up a STEM yell.

We ended the day with the Science session where the girls completed experiments in Chemistry and Physics. The Chemistry activity was chemical reactions, and the girls used baking soda and vinegar to power film canister rockets. This was hugely popular and the girls tried many times to see who's rocket would go the highest. The Physics activity was on centripetal force, which the girls tested by swinging yogurt containers about 1/4 full of water around on strings - and seeing for themselves that the container could be upside down, but the water stayed inside!

The day ended with a brief closing where we sang Make New Friends and Daylight Taps. We then walked back to the High School for pickup and the girls played on the play structure while we waited for parents to arrive.