Chico Junior High students get fun lessons in physics

By CHRIS GULLICK - Staff Writer

Article Launched:  12/23/2006 12:00:00 AM PST

http://www.chicoer.com/newshome/ci_4890206\

"What happens when you suck the air out of things?" asked Dave Webb, chairman of the Northern California Chapter of the American Vacuum Society.

Webb, a visiting scientist from Walnut Creek , spoke to a class of seventh-graders in Mary Anne Pella-Donnelly's life science class at Chico Junior High School Tuesday.

Then he showed them, in about six different ways, what happens when you do suck the air out — collapsing a water bottle, expanding a marshmallow, sealing two hemispheres tightly together, muting a machine and vaporizing water at room temperature.

The visit introduced students to some of the subjects they would study next year in eighth-grade physical science and promoted interest in science projects, in advance of the Chico Science Fair.

Pella-Donnelly admitted her students might find physics more interesting than their current studies in life science.

"Physical science makes sense," she told them, while a lot of life science involves cells and balances that are not visible.

Eighth-graders get to do things like dropping eggs off the school roof, she said, to study physical forces.

Involving volunteer students in every demonstration, Webb showed them the effects of air pressure — and its lack.

When student Forest Taylor assisted him, Webb placed two metal hemispheres loosely together. Then he connected a pump commonly used to pull air out of food storage bags to a valve on one hemisphere and pumped the air out of the space between the two hemispheres. After that, Forest and Webb, pulling from opposite ends, couldn't uncouple the sides.

"We sucked out about 10 of the 14.7 pounds per square inch," Webb stated, and explained how air pressure at sea level exerts 14.7 psi in all directions.

With a quick twist of a valve, Webb made the hemispheres fall apart. The students gasped in surprise.

"There's no magic to physics," Webb said.

In another demonstration, Webb placed a battery-operated device inside a clear plastic dome. The device emitted an annoying whine that made the students complain and plug their ears.

Then he turned on a pump that created a vacuum inside the dome and the whine stopped.

Webb asked the students what happened and they guessed the device had been turned off, the batteries got sucked dry and other answers.

"It's not a sound-sucking pump," Webb teased.

Alex Long finally arrived at the correct answer — there was no air left in the chamber to carry the sound waves.

Webb explained the way sound waves travel through air and criticized "Star Wars" movies that feature space battles, complete with the sounds of shooting and explosions, when no sounds would be heard in the vacuum of space.

He also showed them how a plastic water bottle collapsed when air was pumped out and a picture of a railroad tank car that collapsed when hot air sealed inside it cooled.

"Science is needed in everyday life," he concluded. "Maybe we don't call it physics. Maybe we call it common sense."

Staff writer Chris Gullick can be reached at 896-7760 or cgullick@chicoer.com.

Science a critical deficiency

Chico Enterprise -Record- Letters to Editor 11/9/06

Letter writer Gary Sitton's facts about the condition of education in California are not quite right. Actually, the science education picture is much worse.

The 54 percent figure that Sitton cites relates to those young adults that actually graduated high school. If you include all the students that dropped out of high school in this percentage, then the statewide average of young adults that go on to college following high school goes down to 34 percent. If you only include those students that eventually go on to a four-year college (either directly from high school or through community college), that percentage drops to 26 percent. And finally, if you look at the percentage that actually ends up with a science or engineering degree, it is 4 percent (and of course the north state percentages are lower).

These numbers are just part of the case for a serious call to action, and the answer to this call to action does not reside in just the schools and universities. If we are to make any serious attempt to address this crisis in science education, it will involve partnerships between schools and parents, the private sector and the public sector, and the community and the university. The partnership between the community folksthat formed the museum board and the university (where I am dean of the College of Natural Sciences) represents the type of partnerships our community will need to address this growing crisis in science education. And time is not on our side.

• James Houpis, Chico

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Response to Houpis Letter

James Houpis, Dean of the College of Natural Sciences at CSUC, issued a call to action with regard to the current crisis in science education (letter dated 11/9/06). One of the most important things we can do as parents and educators is to get our kids excited about science and help them to develop confidence in their scientific abilities. The Chico Science Fair has been providing a forum for this type of activity for the last 22 years, largely due to volunteer efforts. Please visit www.ecst.csuchico.edu/csf to see winning projects, workshops and mentoring, and the wide array of awards and prizes made available through the generosity of sponsors and donors The Chico Science Fair Foundation (CSFF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose mission is to support and provide guidance to the Chico Science Fair and ensure the continued availability and vitality of this community-wide celebration of scientific inquiry. CSUC and the CSFF are partners in the effort to establish more support and mentoring opportunities for families and educators interested in participating in the science fair. As a Professor of Computer Science serving as the Director of the Chico Science Fair for a three year term, and a CSFF Board Member, I am assisting in the formation of these relationships. Additionally, we need the support of Chico businesses and organizations to help put the Chico Science Fair on a firm financial footing. As a community working together, we can make a difference!

Judy Challinger
Assistant Professor, Computer Science Department
Director, Chico Science Fair
530-898-6357

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Judy Challinger
www.ecst.csuchico.edu/~judyc
www.pmtech.com/~judy

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