On Wednesday and Thursday before Winter Break, the young scientists in Grade 8 took their talents to a new audience -- their lower school schoolmates. In "magic shows" for several Lower School classes, eighth graders wowed with science tricks that seemed an awful lot like magic -- then explained the science behind what they all just witnessed.
The magic tricks (or experiments) ranged from spontaneously appearing rainbows in water cups with food coloring, the strange behavior of a stream of water when confronted with static electricity, how gravity affects water moving from jars, and more. Students rotated from station to station and could be heard saying "wow" and "how cool!" along the way.
Associate Director of the Middle School Kathleen Nicholson explained to Dragon Digest that the weeks between Thanksgiving and Winter Break pose a unique challenge to faculty members -- how to keep students engaged in a time when it is easy to be distracted? "With this magic show, we decided to lean into the Each for All spirit and do something for other people to keep them motivated. The 8th graders were so into it. Some wore robes and had wands," she explained.
In a debrief with the students presenting they noted how special it was to witness the younger students quickly adopt new science ideas in the short time they spent rotating through the stations. Some of the older students told the Lower Schoolers "I can't wait for you to be in 8th grade. Then you will get to be up here doing magic too." Their faces lit up. This is all part of the magic of being part of a PreK-12 community.
