SORTING IT OUT: And just like that, October is over. In what is likely a November 1st tradition in many a U.S. household, today meant taking inventory of last night's sugary Halloween loot.
Turns out CJ and Annabelle got an absolutely ridiculous amount of candy. We're going to be pawning it off on people for weeks to come. But before we do that, we used it to do a little math. We sorted the candy they received by type, but before tallying them up, we all made predictions about which kind they had the most of. I guessed suckers/lollipops; the kids both guessed chocolate. And now for the numbers (drumroll): Lollipops = 58, hard candy (peppermints, Life Savers, that type of thing)= 39, sugary hard stuff (like Lemonheads, Bottlecaps, etc.) = 19, sugar chewy (taffy, Starburst and so on) = 20, Tootsie Roll = 33, snacks (pretzels/chips) = 7, chocolate = 84+, plastic (spider rings and reflectors) = 4, and last and least, rip offs = 1. Here, CJ shows you what they meant by a rip off.
INCOMING!!!!: Did you know that right now there's largish asteroid hurtling toward our planet?! It's TRUE!! Asteroid 205 YU55 (yes, that's its name) is headed our way. On Nov. 8, it's going to be closer to Earth than our very own moon! (At its closest point it will be about 201k miles from our planet.) This asteroid pass by is the closest this space rock has come for at least the last 200 years.
Today, we watched an hour long Q&A all asteroids and 2005 YU55 via USTREAM. It was broadcast from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, from 2:30 to 3:30 PT. To get ready for it, beforehand we checked out some pages on NASA.gov all about asteroids, including a cool video about the asteroid Vesta, and checked out info about the amazing space lab OSIRIS REx which can collect samples from asteroids and send them back to Earth. Super cool.
The two scientists involved in the program, Don Yeomans and Marina Brozovic of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office, answered some audience questions, which had been submitted electronically. Over and over and over, people asked about 2005 YU55 hitting the Earth. Or the moon. Or causing earthquakes. Or changes in tides. Over and over the scientists said "no way." But the same types of questions kept coming. Clearly, someone(s) out there have been watching too many "Armageddon" type movies.
Naturally, we didn't just sit and listen to the lecture for an hour. There were parts that were just begging for audience participation. For example, when began talking about how some asteroids are rapid rotators, and those often have a satellite, CJ and Annabelle sprang into action to demonstrate that motion!
During the close flyby, scientists will use the massive 70-meter Deep Space Network antenna to study the asteroid.
KNOW WHEN TO FOLD 'EM: Another math project we tackled today involved making flexagons - that's a fun name for a hexagon that can be manipulated via folding and unfolding into displaying different designs. I found out about it via a Tweet from @OnThisDayinMath. I followed their link to the YouTube video demonstrating it and decided we HAD to try it. (The template to cut out to make your own flexagon can be found here: http://sites.google.com/site/moviecreations/flexagon-template.) It's not easy.
BONUS: For just one month, the first 65 years of the most excellent Scientific American magazine are available for free online. No way someone could get through them in a month, but it's worth a try! ;) http://www.nature.com/scientificamerican/archive/index_1909.html
IT GOES BOTH WAYS: Last night while we were staring up at the ISS I had the kids wave, telling them that there was a good chance the astronauts on board were looking down at the Earth right now. Here's a great Web site with video of their view from up there: http://earth.jsc.nasa.gov/Videos/CrewEarthObservationsVideos/
OVERHEARD: After the asteroid conference, Annabelle asked, "Hey CJ, want to play space? Do you want to be a moon, a planet or an asteroid?"
Without hesitation he countered, "I want to be the sun!" :)
The NASA videos from ISS are wonderful. I'll watch them over and over
ReplyDeletere the Scientific Am: a suggestion - you could pick a topic and see how knowledge grew over the 65 years. Like Plate Tectonics, DNA, computers (just their size for one thing), robots, volcanoes... seeing the history would cement the current thinking
Good idead GR on picking one topic. Computers would be especially interesting since they have evolved so much over the past 65 years. I'd be especially interested to see their first mention in Scientific American.
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