Outreach:

Through a generous grant from the AIP Venture Fund and the support of the Society of Rheology, we have developed a series of K12 outreach activities based on the field of rheology. These outreach activites contain a number of demos and hands-on activities aimed at middle school to early high school students. The aim of these activities is to expose a larger number of young kids to a wide array of fascinating STEM topics to hopefully empower students from all walks of life to enter STEM fields.

The next outreach event will be held at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Science in Raleigh, NC on October 20, 2019 from 1-4PM. Volunteers are always welcome. Please email rothstein@ecs.umass.edu if you are interested.

Below you will find links to instructional guides, educational materials and movies for each of the activities we have developed. Feel free to use the instruction guides below to recreate these activities on your own. If you would like our help or if you have suggesions for new activities please email Prof. Rothstein at rothstein@ecs.umass.edu .

List of Demos 

  1. Oobleck 101 (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  2. Slimy spaghetti and meatballs (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  3. Magnetic fluids – they’re alive! (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  4. Incredible swelling gels (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  5. Magical mystery sand (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  6. Tubeless siphon and die swell (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  7. Rod climbing of “anti-gravity” liquids (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  8. The great viscosity race (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  9. Super slippery elastic liquid goo (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  10. Is it liquid or is it solid?  It’s silly putty! (Instruction Guide) (Movie)

  11. Floating with surface tension (Instruction Guide)

  12. The Lotus Effect - Making a Superhydrophobic Surface 1 (Instruction Guide)

  13. The Lotus Effect - Making a Superhydrophobic Surface 2 (Instruction Guide)

  14. Capillary Origami (Instruction Guide) (Movie1) (Movie2)

 

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Site last updated on September 11, 2019