Last night we did the last of four science café's for the opening season, "Don't Stress Me Out," with Dr. Jennifer Byrd-Craven. I felt like this one went really really well in terms of getting across the gist of my guest scientist's work. And, we had a fun activity with the mock experiment.
Here's me, preparing to kick things off with a song. My new song this time was called "It's Not Fair (When Your Mother is a Scientist)."
Here is Dr. Jennifer Byrd-Craven, explaining her work.
This is during the mock experiment. These girls are collecting their spit on a swab, so their stress hormone levels can be measured. (We didn't actually get to measure hormones, but we went through the motions.)
More spit swabs. Each pair was asked either to talk about a problem or design a theme park. The theme park pairs were in the control group. The problem pairs were in the experimental group; we expected to see their stress hormone levels rise.
This pair is designing a theme park.
This pair is discussing a problem. Look how stressed they are!
This topic inspired lots of discussion.
I'm working on a Spring schedule now, so please stay tuned!
