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By ZACK SHIVELY
The Armstrong Air and Space Museum visited the Boardman library on June 11 to teach children about space and sound.
The PLYMC invited the space museum to be one of their many summer programs with the “Reading Rocks” theme. The kicked off the summer activities for the Boardman library. The museum will present at other branches of the PLYMC during the summer discovery program.
“We wanted to incorporate the theme and incorporate space within that theme,” said Olivia Nelson, the presenter for the museum. The organization does various of programs throughout the summer. Nelson said that connecting space and sound was “an interesting bridge.”
The event began with Nelson introducing herself and the museum. She tied the musical theme into her presentation, starting with a discussion on how we process sound through sound waves. She and a child shook a slinky in the front of the room to demonstrate the shape of sound waves.
She used her phone and a microphone to demonstrate that things still make sounds in space but cannot travel through molecules. She played the sounds of planets and the children at the event guessed the planet. For example, a girl knew the planet being played was Jupiter because of the sounds of storms.
Then, Nelson invited five of the attendees up to the front of the meeting room. She gave them tubes called Boomwhackers to hit on the table. The sound of the tubes made a different notes when hit and eight of them together made a full octave.
The children, directed by Nelson, hit the tubes to the tune of “Jingle Bells.” They played this song because the astronauts in the Gemini VI spacecraft used bells and a harmonica to play the song in space.
The children then went to different tables, each with their own eight Boomwhackers. They worked together to learn to play songs like “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” and “The Itsy Bitsy Spider.” After fifteen minutes, the children went one by one and played their songs for the entire group.