Outside the Box – Nicole Kelly

PTO hosted Virtual Science Night this week where students, staff, and parents tuned in on Zoom for a night of experiments and friendly competition. RSI students submitted bridges they engineered out of popsicle sticks and glue. There were so many great, creative and industrial-strength bridges for the Strongest Bridge Competition. Some of these bridges held 112 pounds without even cracking! All the bridges that held the max weight will have a tie-breaker during our last assembly of the year.

Middle School students presented different science experiments and other viewers participated alongside them. Students at home gathered materials and tested the experiment as well and others just watched and enjoyed it. Ella presented the Un-leakable Baggie: If you poke sharp pencils through a baggie full of water, what do you think will happen? She hypothesized that the bag wouldn’t leak when a pencil poked a hole through the bag, but it would leak when the pencil was pulled out. When the pencil poked through both sides of the bag, no water leaked out!
Cara (C13) presented the Pan Flute. She showed the viewers how a musical instrument can simply be made out of a few drinking straws and tape. Chloe (C11) wowed everyone with her experiment on Lemon Power. Using lemons, pennies, alligator clips, and LED lights, she used fruit as a power source to turn in the LED lights! It was fun to see those at home who participated in the  Soda Geyser Eruption. Toby (C11) led everyone through his experiment where he used Mentos and diet soda to make an exploding geyser. A couple of Middle School students also shared the projects they developed for their science class. Rachel (C13) presented her science project on dog’s preferences for different colors, and Kai (C13) presented his science project on memory. Our students did a great job presenting their experiments and walking us through the research.

Thank you to everyone who showed up and participated and to PTO for hosting a night of science and fun!