Super Sky June Day 2

We did some archery first thing this morning. Then we played a version of the Indian game "7 stones". After our hike to the schoolhouse, we started our Bird Study/Identification with the American Goldfinch, Northern Cardinal, Eastern Bulebird and Brown Thrasher. We also made our own bird feeders from recycled materials. They were painted white and we will decorate them, add bird seeds and hang them tomorrow. We also talked about the Earth's rotation on it's axis and around the sun and made shadow drawings to record the Earth's spin. We also discussed how solar panels work (simply: photons knock an electron off a molecule and the electron travels through a conductive layer, through a wire creating a current of electricity to power a light, through a wire back to the bottom of the panel, back through a conductive layer and eventually back to rejoin a molecule needing an electron....then the process can happen all over again!) Then we set up an obstacle course to represent the path of the electron through the solar panel. The white balls were photons that knocked the electron (balloons) off a stand and then the camper grabbed their balloon and ran it through the conductive layer, over the wires and the last conductive layer. They had to hit the balloon back to the starting layer. Then we made up another obstacle course just for fun. We also talked about how we can use the sun to cook food and we put an egg in our solar cooker. We checked on it throughout the afternoon as it cooked. We also played "Scientists Observe" (3 kids leave the room and change one small thing about themselves and the audience must be observant enough to know what changed about them). At the creek, we caught minnows and water beetles. We put them in a container just to view better and then released them back into the creek. We also looked for beautiful quartz stones and played with natural creek clay (see pics of a candle holder and small bowl ).