Deja Royal Blog #4
This week was very exciting!
Everyday at the Science Center there are around four demonstration done by the Guest Experience Specialist (GEX) team/workers. I have seen a couple of these demos, but I have never helped GEX. This week I was able to observe/help/learn a couple demos. GEX encourages for some of the volunteers/interns to learn the demos. On Monday I observed the "Discover DNA" demo. I helped Audrey from GEX by assisting her in setting up the table.
Below is a picture of me observing Audrey extracting DNA from strawberries using isopropyl alcohol, dish soap, water, and salt.
On Tuesday I was able to observe/assist with two demos. The first demo was about hominids, which are "members of the family of humans". This demo was done by Matt from GEX, and I only observed. He had five fake skulls: chimpanzee, Australopithecus (Lucy), Homo erectus, Neanderthal, and Homo sapiens (us). This demo is a lot more complex to understand (at least to me), but it was very interesting. He began by placing three skulls on the table (Australopithecus (Lucy), Homo erectus, Neanderthal), and he asked what each skull looked like. After doing this, he put two more skulls on the table (chimpanzee and Homo sapiens) and arranged them in order. The rest of the demo consisted of him describing the three hominid skulls. I learned alot of really cool information like how Neanderthals were around when we were. I always thought they had died off before we evolved. He also explained that we are related to these hominids, but this relationship is not as direct as parents to children but more like cousins.
Later on that day I helped Audrey with the "Cloud in a Jar" demo. This consisted of filling a couple of beakers with water and adding shaving cream to the water. The shaving cream floats and represents clouds in the sky. She then dropped food coloring to the shaving cream, and when it made its way to the water it looked like rain. She had some talking points about the process of rain, but this demo is more about the visual aspect.
Below is a picture of the "Cloud in a Jar" demo.
On Wednesday the Miss Teen USA contestants paid a visit to the Science Center. Matt was kind enough to go over the hominid demo with me because it really intrigued me. After this quick run through, I observed Matt's "Optics of the Eye" demo. He did this demo for the contestants. He dissected a cow eye because it is very similar to ours. He went through all the parts of the eye as he dissected. I was not able to help with the dissection, but I was able to touch some of the parts of the eye.
Below is a picture of Matt, some of the Miss Teen USA contestants, and I during the "Optics of the Eye" demo.
On Thursday I helped with the Camp Innovation program for the first time. I was placed with the seventh to eighth grade camp. This group's task of the week was to create a carnival game, and they were mostly done because it was close to the end of the week. I helped the group if they needed help. The group also had a session in the Science Center's "Create" space, which is "place where science, design, and engineering collide" or a "maker's place". Their session was all about 3D printing. Create has 9 small 3D printers, and this group had eight peeople so I had a chance to participate in the session. We started off by creating a name tag with the guidance of the person leading the session.
Below are pictures of program we used to create our name tag design and a 3D printer.
This is a link to a video of me 3D printing a cactus:
On Friday I was able to observe Audrey's spectroscopy demo. She has tubes with different elements such as nitrogen and helium. She put these tubes in a device that sent electricity through the tubes. When this happens each element emits certain colors. To view these colors she had the guest put special glasses.
Below is a picture of what can be seen through the glasses. It shows that "white light" emits the rainbow because white is made of all the colors in the rainbow.
This week was full of some very exciting stuff. I really enjoyed observing the demos. I plan to volunteer at the Science Center after this internship is over.
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