October’s Family Science Night was a blast! Retired science teacher Matt Binder joined us to share his knowledge about the life cycle, habits, and different species of mosquitoes. Families learned how best to prevent breeding areas, as well as how to catch and photograph mosquitoes in different locations to share that information through the citizen science app iNaturalist. Thanks for joining us, Matt!

The future engineers of Earl’s Garage tested out their balloon car designs… and found out it was a little harder than expected! Congratulations to the Baril family for building the only car of the evening that successfully made it across the table. A great time was had by all, even though we struggled!

Favorite overheard quote of the evening: “Your mom is learning physics right now!”

1st test run of a successful vehicle!

Discussing design issues

Hmm… what’s going on here?

Thanks to Helene Baril for the live chameleon centerpiece!

Working hard!

Families tested out their engineering skills with an Apollo 13-style challenge: Use the materials on hand to perform a tricky task! Everyone successfully extricated their golf balls from their buckets (no hands allowed inside)!

Gabe showing off his successful device

Armand tests out his prototype

New students joined us in Earl’s Garage to learn basic circuit wiring, and to test out their new knowledge on some creative projects!

Learning to wire up switches

Earl’s Garage was a lot of fun this summer! Students explored everything from the principles of flight to crazy chemical concoctions.

Rylee, Zoe, & Sequoia covered in oobleck

Mateo, Kenison, Darren & Noa exploring elephant toothpaste

 Jaiden working on his mini-ROV

 Davan focuses on wiring up her control box

 ‘Io shows off her cardboard arcade game

Spring Break Hackers harvested motors from discarded machines to build a new machine of their own design.

Photo: Tasmin begins to build her machine. She always has a plan!