At Brookfield Elementary recently, Benjamin Franklin demonstrated a scientific phenomenon to amazed children while Albert Einstein mingled with the crowd.
THEY WERE actually parent Scott Netherland and Principal Kim Brown, respectively, and both were participating in the school's annual Family Science Night called "Bright Ideas."
"The idea was to get families out together to learn about scientists and inventors and do hands-on science," explained event organizer Jacque Netherland, wife of Scott and parent of a Brookfield third-grader. "It was great. We had a good turnout, and everyone enjoyed it."
This year's theme was "A Series of Fortunate Events" — a name with a nod to the Lemony Snicket movie, but a night devoted to some of the fortunate events of scientists and inventors that led to many wonderful inventions.
Sponsored by the school PTA, children participated in a variety of experiments and activities at different stations set up in the cafeteria. In nearby rooms, they also saw live snakes perform, courtesy of a visit from the Reptiles Alive! organization. And they browsed through books at the Usborne bookfair.
Children made a mural of reptiles to tie in with the reptile show, and they also had fun going on a scavenger hunt. Words such as "sound waves" and "refraction" — that tie into their SOLs — were listed on sheets of paper, and students had to find items illustrating them. They were rewarded with small prizes.
MEANWHILE, assisting them in the scientific experiments were parents dressed as famous inventors, plus Rocky Run Middle and Chantilly High students accumulating community-service hours.
Also lending a hand were seven members of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) — including PTA President Dawne LeKang. She manned the Bouncing Buttons station, helping children learn about surface tension by putting drops of water on a penny to see if they could make the penny sink.
"One of SWE's objectives is to reach out to students of all ages, helping them to learn about engineering as a profession," said LeKang. "Today, women only make up 10 percent of all engineers; SWE is committed to helping young women learn about science."
At a table run by three SWE members — Jane Ziki, a software engineer in Reston; and Kim-Lynn Dam and Katie Yassine, both systems engineering majors at GMU — students made musical pan flutes out of drinking straws and cardboard.
"I wanted to help out because I like kids and I like science," said Ziki. "It went quite well, and it was interesting how different children reacted. Some were analytical, some were timid, some were outgoing — and some just wanted to make the flute and go away."
LeKang explained that "actress Hedy Lamarr — decades ahead of her time — came up with a way to remotely control torpedoes during WWII. She used a player piano design." So the SWE members had the students create their own musical instruments, pan flutes.
"IT WAS easy to make, and it was cool," said fourth-grader J.R. Houser, 9. "It turned out really great, and it was fun to tape down the straws [to the cardboard]." His favorite part of the evening, though, was the snake show "because it had one of my favorite snakes, the anaconda."
Still other children enjoyed making replicas of molecules out of colorful gumdrops and toothpicks. Said second-grader Silvia Soto: "That was my favorite thing — because of the candy."
Another popular table was the one manned by Brookfield dad Scott Netherland of Waverly Crossing. "As Ben Franklin, I'm interested in the weather, tornadoes and electricity," he said. "So students are pouring colored water from one bottle to another [directly beneath it]. And by swishing the water in a circular direction, it creates a vortex in the lower bottles — and a tornado is a vortex."
Parents Sam and Lily Xu of Walney Village looked on while their sons, Hans Li, 6, and William Li, 4, watched the swirling liquid in fascination. Pleased with the school's Family Science Night, Sam called it a great idea. "It's very good for the kids," added Lily. "From working with the real thing, they can learn the theory behind it."
Diane Ludden, mother of Brookfield second- and fourth-graders, agreed. "The kids love anything they can put their hands in and get messy with, so this is always a very popular event," she said. "The school relates it to a familiar theme and fun and cool-looking activities. They make it fun, other than the children just studying in their books."
Besides that, she said, "It gives the kids an idea of what they'll do in later grades. And it also helps the school to get the kids to participate in the after-school, hands-on science program, which has similar experiments."
As for the kids, third-grader Noah Michael, 8, said he especially liked the snake show, and the boa constrictor, most of all, "because it was big!" He also thought the tornado bottles were neat "because it looked like there were tornadoes in there."
"It was fun because we got to do lots of experiments and stuff," added fourth-grader Stephanie Nuñez, 9. "And I liked the scavenger hunt to get a prize."