Family Adventures...

The Science Mommy and her family love Star Wars!  So, we couldn't turn down an opportunity to visit the Star Wars exhibit at the Pacific Science Center.  While much of the exhibit was museum-like with artifacts and costumes, there were a few fantastic investigations.  In Star Wars: A New Hope, Luke drives a land speeder around Tatooine.  This investigation connected real world maglev (magnetic levitation) technology with the movie land speeder...

First, the boys chose a lego land speeder, and were prompted to attach magnets to the bottom.  There were two different types of magnets, so they needed to experiment with location and placement ...

...their goal was for the lego land speeder to hover on the magnetic road.

Once the land speeder hovered on the magnetic road, they attached another battery to the top of the lego land speeder.  The new investigation, was to determine the placement of the battery, so that the land speeder was propelled along the magnetic road through wire coils.  This proved quite a challenge for my science padawans.  Not only did they need to determine placement of the previous magnets, the new magnet on the top but they also needed to charge the wire coils at just the right moment to move the car. 

The final challenge, was to move the land speeder along a magnetic road with hills.  I wasn't able to get close enough to capture any pictures.

My Science Kids had a great time!  I was impressed with the information throughout the exhibit connecting movie science fiction to real world applications in science and technology.

What Science Adventures have captivated you and your Science Kids?

Remember, the Rain Gauge Design Challenge is accepting entries through the end of the month.