A taste of science

DAVIS – Does anyone really think about presidents on Presidents Day? The perfect weather gracing this year's holiday didn't conjure thoughts of George Washington for legions of children and adults enjoying a day of leisure in the founding father's name.

But in Davis, a handful of parents managed to sneak in some education for their kids and themselves – under the guise of fun.

The last day of a popular exhibit, "Field to Fridge to Fork: Following Food" at the Explorit Science Center saw families from throughout the region putting hands to work learning, in the most painless of ways, how what we put in our mouths gets to the table and what happens once it goes down the hatch.

Among them were Leia Auyeung, 7, a second-grader at Mariemont Elementary School in Sacramento, and her mother, Janelle, who spent a good 15 minutes intently focused on a rack of heated test tubes.

One by one, Leia hoisted and examined the vials, each of which held an edible oil or liquid. By examining how melted chocolate, corn syrup, maple syrup, water, shortening, butter and peanut butter behaved in the tubes, she learned, in a fun way, about viscosity.

"I love this place – it's all about hands-on experiments. That's how we get kids interested in science," the elder Auyeung said.

"My education is in chemistry," she added, "so I know how important that is."

Just around the corner, Ashley Heeky, 7, a second-grader at Russell Ranch Elementary in Folsom, was working intently on another project: Bundling sticks of wooden "asparagus" into groups of 10 and placing the bundles in a box of the type used to transport the vegetable from field to grocer.

"We wanted to do something fun with the family and had been wanting to come here for a long time," said Ashley's mother, Lori, whose husband, Darren, and son Dillon, 9, were busy studying solvents in the next room.

The Davis science museum, founded 25 years ago as a one-room, after-school enrichment program, moved in September 2006 from the old ranch house it had occupied for more than a decade into its current headquarters in a two-story space on Second Street, adjacent to the Davis Indoor Sports Center. A popular destination for school field trips, the science center on weekends entertains as many adults as kids.

"Sometimes the adults are the ones who have the most fun and get the most involved," said program director Megan Chiosso.

The facility takes a major growth step next month when it opens its first long-term installation, "Move It! Science in Action," featuring nine large-scale, one-of-a-kind exhibits being custom-made for the first-floor space.

Among the sure crowd-pleasers will be an exhibit on bikes and bike riders that will engage museum-goers in using pedal power to explore the efficiency, resistance and other properties of different bicycle types, as well as the physiological effects of exercise on the body. The exhibit opens March 7.

Until then, the space occupied since September by the food exhibit will be closed to the public. But there's plenty more upstairs, where the "Go With the Flow … From Delta to Sea" exhibit lets kids get wet and messy while exploring everything from the physics of floating to the geology of rivers and oceans.

About the writer:

• Call The Bee's Janet Fullwood, (916) 321-1148.