Rare White Giraffes Caught on Camera in Kenya

Today we discussed how animals that live in the desert have adaptations that allow heat energy to escape, while animals that live in the Arctic or Antarctic are adapted to retain their body heat. How do you think the surface area of an animal could make a difference to its ability to retain or release heat?
Then I came across this article about these rare white giraffes captured on video just recently and it got me wondering...are white giraffes better adapted to their habitat than regular giraffes or are they at a disadvantage? What do you think?

With the Science Fair coming up we have put our thinking hats on about suitable projects that could be worth investigating. There are lots of really fun experiments that sound exciting but how useful is it really, to know which cola works best if you want to make a cola and Mentos volcano? Trying to find investigations that are going to have some practical application to our lives could be the start of something much more amazing.
Look at these incredible young people that are exploring science that could change the world.

Teen Invents Better Way To Keep Germs Out

Amazing Teen Scientists Covered in the Media

You Are Not the Centre of the Universe

Putting things into perspective, we are tiny, really tiny.

Amazing Worlds Within Our Worlds

We are surrounded by ordinary things... but how well do we really know them? Watch this video of macro photos of every day objects by photographer Pyanek and see how many you can guess?

Can Eating Insects Save the World BBC full Documentary 2013 ( Insect eat...

Well, what do you think? The idea of eating insects made most of us feel a little squeamish but after watching this documentary our whole group is feeling pretty keen to at least give them a go! Hey, if it's going to save the world...!

Breathing Fire

Did you know fire needs oxygen to breathe? Today we did an experiment to show how important oxygen is to a fire? Without it, it dies! We put a small, a medium and a large jar over a burning candle and timed how long it took fr  the flame to go out each time. We discovered that the flame burned longer in the largest jar. Of course this is because the largest jar contains the most oxygen!

Hidden Wonders of the Natural World

We live in a world of unseeable beauty, so subtle and delicate it is imperceptible to the human eye. To bring this invisible world to light filmaker Louie Schwartzberg bends the boundaries of time and space with high speed cameras, time lapses and microscopes. At TED 2014, he shares highlights from his latest project, a 3D film titled "Mysteries of the Unseen World," which slows down, speeds up and magnifies the astonishing wonders of nature.

Disappearing Shells

Eggs are amazing! Today we investigated the principles of OSMOSIS and DIFFUSION so that we can better understand what is happening in more experiments we have planned. Did you know eggs have a membrane inside the shell?
This membrane allows some substances to pass through while keeping other substances out. This is called osmosis. We experimented with this idea by mixing salt and lentils and then passing them through a sieve to simulate the membrane. Only the tiny particles of salt were able to pass through the sieve.

Next we looked at diffusion. We put a couple of drops of food colouring into a glass of water and watched. When first dropped into the water, the part of the water that shows colour has a high concentration of food colouring. Over time, the colour begins to spread throughout the water to areas with no colour (low concentration of food colouring). Eventually, the colour is evenly spread throughout the entire glass of water.

 

How Strong is an Eggshell?

 We all know eggs are very fragile, right? Today we did an experiment to see just how easily they break. First we emptied the egg and cleaned out the shell. We drew a line aroung the egg and then broke the shell off down to the line. We had to be extremely careful because the shell was very easy to break. Once we had four eggshells ready we placed them on the tray and started loading books on top of them! We were pretty sure they would break but we had THIRTEEN books stacked on top of the eggshells before the first one cracked. Eggshells were much stronger than we realised so the wee chicks inside are kept safe. We also found some building structures that use domes and arches to give them strength.

Monsters Under the Bed?

Have you heard of Rube Goldberg? Very briefly he was an American cartoonist best known for his cartoons depicting deliberately over engineered gadgets that perform simple tasks in convoluted ways. Many people have created their own Rube Goldberg machines and contraptions, even kids! Have a look at what Audri has created to trap a monster!


Have a go yourself. We would love to see a cartoon or a construction of your very own Rube Goldberg machine. What are you capable of?

Another Look at Last Year's Science Fair Success

This information has been moved from the Science Fair page to make way for the 2013 Science Fair.

Below are the 2012 entries and winners. Joe, Cameron and Liam went on to win 2nd Place in the Physical World category at the Waikato Science Fair and Sonya and Kirsten went on to win a Highly Commended award at the Waikato Science Fair.

Following a great deal of hard work students finally submitted their project boards for judging at our school science fair. The investigations were varied and included finding which fruits grow the most mould, which soft drinks create the best Mentos volcanoes and which firewood burns best. Thanks to Pamela Dunn and Jasmine Ahmu for judging the competition.

And the winners were:

1st place: Kirsten Maclaurin and Sonya Fenton with Menacing Mould

2nd place: Joe Harris, Cameron Mailer and Liam Loveridge with Fire Fury

3rd place: Joel Geissmann with Tough Stuff



Highly Commended: New Helper by Jennifer Qiu





Fishy Business by Katie Simpson

Liquid Electricity by Katelynn Pini and Jemma Goodall





Bombs Away by Brendan Hunt and Brandyn Smith

Science Fair 2012

Recently we held our Kimihia School Science Fair. It was exciting to see the students involved sharing their work and discussing their investigations with the judges, and then later with classes that came to view the projects. Today the winners of the School Science Fair took their boards to the Waikato Science Fair in Hamilton. We are anxiously awaiting the results from that competition to see how well we fared. Check out the Science Fair page to see all the project boards and the results of our School Science Fair.

Science Alive Pt 2

Yesterday a group of students from Team 2 investigated capillary action. We already knew about molecules of air and found out about molecules of water. They like to stick together and this is called cohesion. We also discovered that some materials like paper and fabric are made with fibres and have tiny holes between the fibres that the water molecules are attracted to. This is the reason some materials mop up spills better than others. The plastic bag didn't work at all!

Fonterra Science Roadshow

This afternoon 85 students travelled to the Fonterra Science Roadshow at Te Kauwhata College. What a great afternoon we had exploring scientific concepts through hands on exhibits. We learnt all sorts of things about light, density, colour, the human body, earthquakes,      tsunamis, liquifaction and lots, lots more.

Science Alive

This term two groups of budding young scientists will be working on a range of experiments to make discoveries about the world around them.

Have you ever wondered how water and nutrients from the soil reach the leaves of trees? Or why a sponge mops up a spill when a plastic bag doesn't? It's all down to capillary action and we spent some time discovering how this works. Watch as we see capillary action at work

.

If you would like to do this experiment at home you can find the instructions to make your own Magic Flowers here.

Bug Lunch

Did you know that different insects have very different mouths depending on what they eat? Some insects chew, some suck and some lap. You can watch several insects at work through the links below, but watch out....when you are an insect you need to keep your eyes open or you might BE lunch!

House fly

Wart-biter Cricket

Bullet Ant

Monarch Butterfly

Intriguing Insects

With summer here the crickets and cicadas are singing up a storm. A small group of children are working to find out about the insects around us. Below there are several links to some short videos explaining the life cycles of different types of insects.
 The Life Cycle of a Butterfly
The Amazing Life Cycle of a Cicada
The Life of a Praying Mantis
Once you have watched the video clips see if you can complete the Metamorphosis Quiz to reveal a close up picture of one member of our intriguing insect world.