Science Olympiad

It's over!! Hooray!

On Friday, we all had a wonderful, science-filled day at CDIS. Science Olympiad went off splendidly, as long as you overlook the minor snafu here or there. (leaving some room for improvement, that's all!) Each student completed in 4 different events. Here were some of the more exciting ones:

"Storm the Castle" required the students to build a catapult that used a 10lb counterweight as the only means of flinging a marble as far and as accurate as possible.


Perhaps the most controversial event was Bridge Building, which required the students to design and build a structure to span a 35cm gap, and hold a very heavy bucket of sand. The controversy came because EVERY bridge violated some rule - not wide enough, not long enough, not make of the correct materials, etc. I'm glad I didn't judge this event - there were some upset kids!

This picture is our multipurpose room, where the bridges were judged. Here the middle school kids are huddled around, watching the bridges being tested.

This video shows a high school group being tested. Not only did it break, it was also not wide enough!

Rachel judged egg drop, which is probably the most popular event of the day. The students are given a bag of materials, and have to assemble a protective container for their raw egg, which was dropped 2 stories. The winner kept their egg safe AND were closest to the target below.

The final fun event I have video from was Bottle Rockets. In this event, the students converted 2 liter plastic bottles into rockets that were shot into the air using air pressure. The one that stayed in the air longest was the winner.

I enjoyed the day, and I heard a lot of good comments from my homeroom. They definitely enjoyed the day more than a normal school day.

Then again, that's probably because they got more basketball time than they normally do!

-alan