but it's cold outside and it's gonna
warm up this weekend but in this winter
weather there's still so many fun things
to do at the Ann Arbor hands-on Museum
and we're gonna share a couple of them
with you today on this frigid morning
and joining me are Etta Heisler director
of programs at Ann Arbor hands-on museum
and Leslie's science and nature Center
and Beth Sheva glad educator at Leslie's
science and nature center thank you guys
for being here of course it's our
pleasure and you guys have a lot of cool
shows and exhibits coming up and you're
gonna demonstrate a couple of us and
first we're gonna talk mechanical energy
being converted to electrical energy and
this is part of your luminosity show
this weekend correct yeah so we have
professor ray from Professor Ray's
everyday science coming this weekend
we'll have shows at 1:00 and 3:00 on
Saturday and Sunday included with museum
admission and he's going to be talking a
little bit about how we convert energy
into light so if you want to step up
here
you're just gonna turn this crank and
we're gonna try to light up the LED
strip here on this exhibit so go ahead
and give it a turn nice
yes mechanical energy yeah your body
when it moves makes kinetic energy and
then it's confused it's like this kind
of yeah and then it gets converted into
mechanical energy through this generator
so if you stop winding it for a second
what we're gonna do is it's powering
this LED strip but when I turn on the
fan it's going to double the load and
when it gets converted this generator
converts mechanical energy into
electrical energy in order to power
these two things so go ahead and give it
a crazy that is it easier harder than it
was before yeah because now we've
doubled the load we have two different
things that we're trying to run what a
great way for kids to understand how all
of this works yeah and we have a ton of
different exhibits at the Museum about
generators energy different kinds of
things like that and then professor ray
will be here this weekend and apparently
he's also gonna make a pickle glow so
we'll also get to learn a little bit
about chemical energy and things like
that that's gonna be very cool all right
so next up is critters up-close worms
and friends that's happening next
weekend
February 9th to the 10th so which
critters do we have here so today we
brought some
let's see some earthworms here here's
our camera right there we went oh yeah I
know right
earthwards they've been kind of hiding
they stay away from the light because
they don't want to get dried out and
they don't want to get eaten by stuff
they can see them but these little
animals study and let's tilt it down
tilt it this way just a bit okay sure
got that Kevin ooh look they're moving
so you can even see dark lines down the
center of the worms they're called red
wigglers or ice any a fatigue and that's
them eating that's the really because
they're eating mushy things that live in
the sort so things like mushy vegetation
bacteria fungus and then that gets
digested and it comes out the other end
as soil that's crazy so that's not like
just normal like striations on their
body that's them processing food
vertical stripes yeah crazy so tell us
how worms help our soil you said they
digest things and then that comes out as
soil yeah so just really the way I
incipit name our castings okay
you could also say worm poop butt
castings are really really rich soil
that the worms have broken down from the
things they've been eating and there are
recyclers they take all the old things
that have been lying around and they
turn them into something that they and
other animals and plants can use such as
kissing you want to talk about what we
feed our worms at the Lesley science and
nature center budget Lesley science the
Nature Center we they have a bet both
bedding which is food and a place for
them to hide so we feed them coconut
fiber newspaper and we also feed them
old fruits and vegetables in our bin
right now we have some old mushy apple
cores and old leaves so what's in this
box
so that is a verba form composting bin
it's the worms home and it is made out
of two plastic bins the outer bin is
just to keep the liquid in that so it
can drain the inner bin has holes
drilled in it so air can get in and
moisture can get out and the worms hang
out in the bottom underneath the
newspaper and the coconut casts coconut
fiber and we put some food in there and
they get to work eating it and making
castings this is very cool we can build
one of these habitats for it oh yeah it
is a drill in a couple of this is so
cool you thank you so much for being
here of course we're there website for
all the information on the shows and
exhibits and everything happening this
weekend and all through the winter
perfect place to take the kiddos thanks
Tati thank you