Masks and vaccinations are recommended. Plan your visit
Create a series of boundaries that keep some things out while letting other things through.
Note: There is now a readily available, competitively priced commercial alternative you may wish to explore before (or instead of) undertaking this Snack. It may be worthwhile to weigh the cost-benefit of building the Snack from scratch versus buying its commercial counterpart.
Hold the container upright and shake it. The round objects will fall through the screens until they hit a screen that they are too big to fall through. You should end up with the objects all sorted out on each of the four levels!
Turn the container upside down and shake it, and all of the objects will end up in the top section of the container.
You can uncap the container, remove the objects, and add different ones. Try to find other sets of objects that are the right sizes to be sorted by the giant sieve.
This is a sieve that sorts objects by size. Its screens act as boundaries, allowing objects that are small enough to pass through and preventing the passage of objects that are too large.
There are many natural boundaries that sort objects by size. A familiar example is a small animal hiding in a hole small enough to act as a boundary to its larger predator. No boundaries are perfect; all allow some things to leak through. Boundaries that determine passage based on size are common.
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Attribution: Exploratorium Teacher Institute