Lake Forest Country Day School Family Math & Science Night is a Great Success!

This past Wednesday night the unthinkable occurred: students stayed at school willingly and enthusiastically until right around eight o’clock at night. To many, this incomprehensible fact may seem to make no sense. However, what does make sense, at least in terms of scientifically exact sense, are the Laws of Newton, with which these students were experimenting in at LFCDS well past school hours. The occasion that brought about this improbable outcome, you may ask? Wednesday night was the annual LFCDS “Family Math Night.” Except this year, there was a twist in what will from here on out be dubbed the “Seed to STEM + Family Math and Science Night.”

Since LFCDS has placed an increasingly important emphasis on its STEM + Program (Science Technology Engineering Math), and in order to more appropriately cater to the added focus on technology, science, and engineering, the School decided to modify the beloved “Family Math Night.” A little before 6:00 p.m., students and parents alike came bounding through the front entrance and were greeted by various teachers and administrators in white lab coats, eagerly awaiting the newest alterations to the annual event. At about 6:00 p.m., these same students and parents split into groups and began visiting the numerous experiment stations set up throughout the School.

Within minutes, the distinct sound of rolling wheels, popping of air compressed launchers, and the humming of beads bouncing up and down on top of vibrating speaker boxes filled the air. While the audio experience was quite impressive to hear, the visual scenes were even more exciting to behold. At one station, children and parents vied for the speed king title as they raced Lego cars down a wooden decline track. Across the hall in the gym, air rockets could be seen soaring across the sky as they were shot through hula hoops for extra points.

Perhaps the strangest sights—and sounds—of all however were the popular banana bongos and celery piano that were put to the test. This fruitful experiment demonstrated many scientific principles, including Newton’s Law that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. The action in this case was the pounding of a banana with your hand, while the reaction was the sound or waves that resulted from the impact. How did this work? The computer had a certain firmware that could detect pressure using Human Interface Device (HID) technology. The computer was wired to a circuit board with a microcontroller. By wiring the circuit board to the banana and holding tin foil in your hand (which completed the circuit), you were able to emit a sound from the computer by banging on the banana or celery.

Other fun and interactive stations involved a blimp experiment, which soon filled the room with dozens of hovering balloons, a pendulum golf putter—a favorite of the dads in attendance—and marshmallow launchers. Although LFCDS boasts one singular state-of-the-art, and newly built “innovation lab,” which houses a 3D printer and tornado simulator—among other scientific marvels—the entire School was transformed into one, giant innovation lab on Wednesday night as families came together in pursuit of scientific and mathematical truths.

A giant success, this event is sure to continue many years into the future. The only question is how far and to what extent science and technology will change in the coming years. Based on the seriousness with which LFCDS conducts its STEM + program, it is not out of the question to expect some more impossible, seemingly incomprehensible feats at future Seed to STEM + nights.