View transcript
[00:00:00.00]
(gentle music)

[00:00:03.04]
- Lets fly.
- Oh boy.

[00:00:05.02]
- That's beautiful.

[00:00:14.00]
(children and teacher chatting)

[00:00:15.05]
- Yeah.

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(upbeat music)

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- Hi, this is Viv and
welcome to Story time Science

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at the Exploratorium, today's
episode is Flying Things.

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We're going to read Rosie Revere, Engineer

[00:00:50.06]
by Andrea Beatty illustrated
by David Roberts.

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And then we're gonna do three activities.

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We're going to make three
different kinds of flying things

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out of paper and none of
them look like airplanes.

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This is the story of Rosie Revere,

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who dreamed of becoming a great engineer.

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in Lila Greer's classroom
at Blue River Creek,

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young Rosie sat, shyly,
not daring to speak.

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But when no one saw her,
she peaked in the trash

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for treasures to add
to her engineer stash.

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And late, late at night,
Rosie rolled up her sleeves

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and built in her hideaway, under the eaves.

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Alone in her attic, the moon high above,

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dear Rosie made gadgets
and gizmos, she loved.

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And when she grew sleepy,
she hid her machines

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far under the bed where
they'd never be seen.

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When Rosie was young,
she had not been so shy.

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She worked with her hair
swooping over one eye

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and made fine inventions
for uncles and aunts 

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-- a hotdog dispenser and helium pants!

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The uncle she loved most
was zookeeper, Fred.

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She made him a hat to
keep snakes off his head.

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From parts of a fan and
some cheddar cheese spray

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which everyone knows
keeps the pythons away.

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And when it was finished,
young Rosie was proud

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but Fred slapped his knee
and he chuckled out loud,

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he laughed till he wheezed and
his eyes filled with tears.

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Oh, to the horror of Rosie Revere

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who stood there embarrassed,
perplexed, and dismayed.

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She looked at the cheese
hat and then looked away.

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"I love it," Fred, hooted, "Oh, truly I do!"

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But Rosie Revere knew
that could not be true.

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She stuck the cheese hat
on the back of her shelf.

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And after that day kept
her dreams to herself.

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And that's how it went
until one autumn day.

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Her oldest relation showed up for a stay.

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Her great-great aunt
Rose was a true dynamo,

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who'd worked building
airplanes a long time ago.

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She told Rosie tales of
the things she had done

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and goals she had checked
off her list, one by one.

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She gave a sad smile as
she looked to the sky,

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"The only thrill left on my list is to fly.

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But time never lingers
as long as it seems.

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I'll chalk that one up
to an old lady's dreams."

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That night as Rosie laid wide eyed in bed,

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a daring idea crept into her head.

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Could she build a gizmo
to help her aunt fly?

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She looked at the cheese
hat and said, "No, not I."

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But questions are tricky,
and some hold on tight.

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And this one kept Rosie
awake through the night.

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So when dawn approached and
red streaks lit the sky,

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young Rosie knew just
how to make her aunt fly.

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She worked and she worked
till the day was half gone.

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Then she hauled her cheese
copter out onto the lawn

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to give her invention a test,

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just to see the ridiculous
flop it might turn out to be.

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Strapped in the cockpit,
she flipped on the switch,

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the helio cheese copter,
sputtered, and twitched.

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It floated a moment and
whirled round and round

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then froze for a heartbeat
and crashed to the ground.

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Then Rosie heard laughter
and turned around to see

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the old woman laughing
and slapping her knee.

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She laughed till she wheezed
and her eyes filled with tears,

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all to the horror of Rosie Revere,

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who thought, oh no, never, not ever again.

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will I try to build something to sputter

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or spin or build with a
lever, a switch or a gear

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and never will I be a great engineer.

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She turned round to leave,

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but then great-great Aunt Rose

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grabbed a hold of young
Rosie and pulled her in close

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and hugged her and kissed
her and started to cry.

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"You did it hooray, it's
the perfect first try!

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This great flop is over
it's time for the next."

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Young Rosie was baffled,
embarrassed, perplexed.

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'I failed, said dear Rosie,
it's just made of trash.

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Didn't you see it?

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The cheese-copter crashed."

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"Yes!" said her great aunt,
"It crashed, that is true.

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But first it did just
what it needed to d.,

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Before it crashed Rosie,
before that, it flew!"

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"Your brilliant first flop
was a raging success!

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Come on, let's get busy and onto the next!"

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She handed a notebook to Rosie Revere

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who smiled at her aunt
as it all became clear.

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Life might have its failures,
but this was not it.

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The only true failure
can come, if you quit.

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They worked till the sun
sneaked away to its bed

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aunt Rose tied her head
scarf around Rosie's head

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and sent her to sleep
with a smile ear to ear,

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to dream the bold dreams
of a great engineer.

[00:08:17.04]
At Blue River Creek all
the kids in grade two

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build gizmos and gadgets
and doohickeys too.

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With each perfect failure
they all stand and cheer,

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but none quite as proudly as Rosie Revere.

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I wanna do a little experiment.

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I have a book.

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In fact, the book we just read,

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and I'm gonna drop it onto the table.

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What's gonna happen?

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Let's find out.

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(book thudding on table)

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Ooh, straight down on the table,

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made the noise, made a little
bit of wind flutter the paper.

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Now I'm going to drop this
piece of paper onto the tabletop.

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What's gonna happen?

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Is it just gonna go thud?

[00:09:07.02]
Maybe, maybe not, let's find out.

[00:09:11.00]
I'll do it from a little higher up even.

[00:09:14.01]
It's sort of floats down gently.

[00:09:17.02]
Now gravity wants to pull
on the piece of paper

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the same as it pulls on the book.

[00:09:23.08]
So they should both drop at the same time,

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but what gets in the way of the paper?

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Because it's really flimsy,

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air gets in the way of the paper.

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Air is really important for flying

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and we can't really see
it, we can breathe it,

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can kind of feel it maybe,
but it's there, all right.

[00:09:44.02]
Now I'm gonna try an experiment

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where I put the piece of
paper on top of the book,

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and I'm gonna hold it up above my head

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and I'm gonna let it drop to the tabletop.

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What do you think is gonna happen?

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I mean, maybe the paper might float off

[00:10:00.04]
of the top of the book
and float down separately.

[00:10:02.08]
Let's find out.

[00:10:04.03]
(book thudding on table)

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The paper and the book fell

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because gravity is pulling
on them exactly the same,

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but the paper didn't float down,

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because the book pushed
the air out of the way.

[00:10:21.04]
So gravity was able to do,
what it really wanted to do,

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which is to have them fall
at exactly the same time.

[00:10:29.00]
All right, so let's remember
air is the important factor.

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Let's start by making a
gyro-copter or a roto-copter.

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Now there's a pattern for this
on the Exploratorium website.

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I printed this one out

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but I'm actually gonna make
it from scratch, so to speak.

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Let's see, I'll go ahead

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and kind of, you can
see the piece of paper,

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the sheet of paper that I'm using

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and this is card stock,
it's a little heavier.

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It doesn't have to be heavier paper.

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It can be regular paper,
construction paper

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or this thicker card stock.
I like this stuff.

[00:11:09.01]
So you can see it's a little bit bigger,

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but that doesn't really matter.

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I am just gonna pretty
much do the proportions.

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I'm gonna measure. This one
is about two inches wide.

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This is about an inch and a half wide.

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I am just going to do
the propellers first.

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So I'm going to mark part of the way down

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where the propellers will be.

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So I'm going to make a mark with a pencil

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and I'll show you right here.

[00:11:39.01]
So that line in between,

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those are going to be
the two propellers, okay?

[00:11:46.01]
And then I want a little bit
of space and I will measure it,

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'cause we're gonna fold it at the bottom.

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And again, I'll show you.

[00:11:59.05]
And hopefully this one I made from scratch

[00:12:01.07]
will work as well.

[00:12:04.08]
Okay.

[00:12:06.08]
And I made two little
indentation lines there

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and I'm gonna do a line straight down,

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and a line straight down,

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'cause we're gonna fold this part.

[00:12:18.04]
Okay.

[00:12:21.00]
So a line straight down.

[00:12:27.05]
I'm not being exact, but that's okay.

[00:12:29.04]
It's gonna work anyway, I hope.

[00:12:33.06]
All right, so now, I'm going
to make some cuts, all right?

[00:12:38.06]
I'm gonna cut between the two propellers.

[00:12:41.02]
I'm not gonna cut anything off,

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I'm just gonna cut the straight
line and stop right there.

[00:12:51.04]
Okay and stop.

[00:12:53.07]
And now again, I'm not
gonna cut anything off.

[00:12:56.05]
I'm going to snip this line, snip.

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And I'm going to, I have to
contort myself to do this.

[00:13:07.02]
I'm gonna do it for myself
here and then I'll show you,

[00:13:10.02]
snip on the other side.

[00:13:13.06]
So I made two little snips right there,

[00:13:19.07]
and now I'm gonna fold those in.

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And I'm folding it

[00:13:26.01]
so it will be a little
heavier on the bottom.

[00:13:29.07]
Not so that gravity can
pull on it any differently.

[00:13:34.00]
It's still gonna pull on the same,

[00:13:35.06]
but so that it'll cut through
the air a little bit more.

[00:13:39.01]
So you can see, I folded,

[00:13:42.02]
I made those two snips and
then I folded and I folded.

[00:13:46.09]
And I'm even gonna fold a
little piece at the bottom up,

[00:13:50.03]
just so that it can cut
through the air even better.

[00:13:54.00]
And ooh, I have some paper clips.

[00:13:56.06]
I'm gonna add a paper clip on the bottom,

[00:13:59.02]
just to hold that little
fold-up flap in place.

[00:14:02.07]
And to help it cut
through the air even more.

[00:14:05.02]
Now you have your two propellers.

[00:14:08.01]
And one has to fold one way

[00:14:10.08]
and the other one has
to fold the other way.

[00:14:13.03]
So I'm folding one this way,

[00:14:18.01]
and then I'm folding the
other one the other way.

[00:14:20.07]
So, they're opposite from each other.

[00:14:26.00]
Now I'm gonna try and throw it.

[00:14:27.08]
You wanna get as much height
as possible from this,

[00:14:31.07]
and I'm going to hold
it by the paper clip.

[00:14:37.05]
And I'm gonna have the
propellers behind me.

[00:14:40.09]
So like over my shoulder
and I'm gonna pitch it

[00:14:44.02]
like I'm pitching a softball.

[00:14:45.08]
(drum rolls)

[00:14:47.01]
(gentle music)

[00:14:53.06]
The second flying thing
we're gonna make is very simple.

[00:14:57.07]
It's called a spinning blimp.

[00:15:00.04]
And for this, I like to
use construction paper,

[00:15:04.01]
again you can try regular paper card stock.

[00:15:07.01]
They're good experiments to try.

[00:15:08.09]
Try different thicknesses and
different weights of paper.

[00:15:11.08]
But I like using construction
paper for this one.

[00:15:14.09]
So, I have some, ooh, nice
red construction paper.

[00:15:18.08]
Oh, I have two sheets here

[00:15:22.01]
and I'm just gonna cut
a strip that is about,

[00:15:26.08]
I'll measure it since I have a ruler here,

[00:15:28.06]
and it's always handy to
use your measuring tools.

[00:15:31.09]
Oh, it's about an inch wide.

[00:15:34.00]
So I'm just gonna eyeball it, cool.

[00:15:39.07]
And I'm going to cut a strip
of paper about an inch wide.

[00:15:44.04]
It doesn't have to be super long.

[00:15:46.04]
It could be another good experiment.

[00:15:49.03]
Try different lengths of paper,

[00:15:51.02]
different widths of paper. Now,
because I want to attach it,

[00:15:59.05]
I have to make a little bit of a cut,

[00:16:01.08]
again I don't wanna cut
that all the way off.

[00:16:05.08]
I just wanna make a
little cut like a slot,

[00:16:10.08]
so that it will fit with the
little cut on the opposite side

[00:16:16.06]
of the other end of it.

[00:16:19.02]
That way they'll just fit
right in to each other.

[00:16:28.01]
Just like that.

[00:16:30.00]
I'm gonna go ahead and do it.

[00:16:31.02]
So I'm going to cut about halfway in,

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and the other thing you wanna think about

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is, how do I want my little wings?

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I guess we can call these wings.

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So I want super big wings

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and a smaller body of my spinning blimp.

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Do I want a larger body and smaller wings?

[00:16:52.09]
Good experiments,

[00:16:54.03]
all of these are really
good experiments to try.

[00:16:57.02]
I'm going to, let's see,
I'll do this about halfway.

[00:17:01.03]
So I am going to make a little snip.

[00:17:03.05]
Again, I'm not cutting anything
off until I get halfway in.

[00:17:08.06]
So I did that right there, okay?

[00:17:12.07]
I didn't cut all the way through.

[00:17:14.00]
I stopped when I got to the halfway point.

[00:17:18.01]
Now I'm gonna measure where that went in,

[00:17:20.07]
oh, about half an inch.

[00:17:21.07]
So I'm going to take the opposite side.

[00:17:25.02]
Okay, the opposite end
of the strip of paper,

[00:17:28.00]
and instead of cutting in this way,

[00:17:30.06]
I'm going to cut in that way.

[00:17:34.08]
All right, let me turn it upside down.

[00:17:37.00]
And again, I'm only
going to cut halfway in.

[00:17:46.03]
Okay, so now you have this little snip.

[00:17:51.07]
It's on this side of the strip of paper.

[00:17:54.04]
And now I have this little
snip, which is on this side

[00:17:58.02]
of the strip of paper.

[00:17:59.08]
And now they should just
sort of fit together.

[00:18:02.08]
Oh, I don't have my wings
exactly the same length,

[00:18:06.04]
but that's okay.

[00:18:08.01]
Let's fit it in there.

[00:18:10.03]
All right good, and it holds together.

[00:18:14.02]
(drum rolls)

[00:18:16.01]
(upbeat music)

[00:18:24.00]
Now we are gonna make a ring glider.

[00:18:26.08]
This one's pretty cool.

[00:18:29.01]
So we just take a regular
eight and a half by eleven

[00:18:32.03]
sheet of paper, this is like normal paper.

[00:18:35.02]
And it's floppy paper.

[00:18:36.06]
It's paper that you would write on.

[00:18:38.06]
And we wanna go from this
corner to this corner, sort of,

[00:18:43.02]
but actually we want the fold

[00:18:47.09]
to be along this line,

[00:18:50.07]
from that corner to that corner.

[00:18:52.05]
Because it's a rectangle and not a square,

[00:18:55.06]
we're not gonna be able
to fold it exactly.

[00:18:58.04]
So we're gonna get what I like to call

[00:19:00.01]
two little mountain peaks.

[00:19:01.07]
So I'm going to make the fold

[00:19:03.09]
from this corner to this
corner, where my fingers are.

[00:19:10.02]
And I'm gonna try and make
that fold as exact as I can.

[00:19:15.06]
There we go, not perfect,
but so few things are.

[00:19:24.01]
Okay, and I'm gonna make
sure that's folded.

[00:19:26.06]
So you can see I have
kind of like two little

[00:19:28.06]
mountain peaks.

[00:19:29.05]
Actually let me make those
a little bit more even.

[00:19:34.02]
Better, so I'm a refolding

[00:19:35.07]
and I made it a little bit more
even, a little more perfect.

[00:19:39.05]
Always trying to get
there, rarely succeeding.

[00:19:43.04]
So now I've folded that sheet of paper.

[00:19:50.04]
So then I have these two
little mountain peaks.

[00:19:53.09]
Now I wanna turn this
bottom part into a ring.

[00:19:59.06]
Again to make it a little bit better,

[00:20:02.09]
to cut through the air.

[00:20:05.01]
So I'm going to fold.

[00:20:10.04]
I'll show you in a second.

[00:20:13.02]
I'm folding like a really,
really narrow strip

[00:20:17.07]
of the bottom and I'm gonna
end up doing this like,

[00:20:21.05]
three or four times.

[00:20:23.03]
So here I folded from the bottom

[00:20:28.00]
and I really creased it well.

[00:20:30.05]
Now I'm gonna fold again,
really narrow like this.

[00:20:34.01]
So I'm gonna make another fold.

[00:20:43.09]
So I folded it yet again at the bottom.

[00:20:48.00]
All right, that's a lot of
paper here at the bottom

[00:20:51.08]
and I'm gonna fold it yet
again a third time narrowly.

[00:20:55.06]
I'm just gonna fold that up.

[00:21:04.09]
All right that should be enough.

[00:21:07.05]
Now I wanna turn this into a circle

[00:21:10.08]
and the way I'm gonna do that
is like stretching the paper,

[00:21:14.02]
and I'm gonna use the edge
of the table to do that.

[00:21:19.01]
I'm gonna hold it here and
I'm gonna hold it here,

[00:21:22.04]
nice and securely,

[00:21:23.08]
'cause I don't wanna
tear that sheet of paper.

[00:21:26.00]
I just wanna run this
along the edge of the table

[00:21:30.06]
to start curving it a little.

[00:21:32.00]
I'll show you what's
gonna start to happen.

[00:21:38.09]
So you can see it's
already starting to curve

[00:21:41.08]
just a little bit.

[00:21:43.05]
I'm gonna keep doing it a little bit more.

[00:21:50.00]
Oh, see, it's really curving even more.

[00:21:53.00]
I'm just stretching out the paper.

[00:21:55.07]
And I'll do it just once more
'cause it's kind of fun to do.

[00:22:04.09]
All right, we have a nice curve.

[00:22:07.00]
Now what I'm going to do

[00:22:08.06]
is I am going to turn this into a circle

[00:22:14.02]
and this little tip right here,

[00:22:17.05]
is gonna fit really well right in there.

[00:22:20.06]
And I'm gonna add a little piece of tape.

[00:22:22.08]
You don't necessarily need to add tape,

[00:22:26.05]
but it helps it stick together.

[00:22:29.02]
So there, I slid this.
Let me do that again.

[00:22:33.03]
I've got this little point
and I'm gonna just slide it

[00:22:38.01]
right in there, not super far,

[00:22:41.03]
but just so you can see
it even holds by itself.

[00:22:44.07]
But, I'm going to add some
tape just to make sure.

[00:22:53.00]
Oop, gotta add that tape.

[00:22:57.00]
Here it is again, there it is.

[00:22:59.06]
And I'm just gonna add the tape.

[00:23:01.06]
The tape will also help it
besides sticking together,

[00:23:05.06]
that little extra piece of tape

[00:23:07.01]
is gonna help it cut through
the air a little bit more.

[00:23:10.04]
Not the most neat and
tidy, but that's all right.

[00:23:13.06]
So I put an extra little
piece of tape there.

[00:23:16.05]
Now you can feel around this ring, okay?

[00:23:22.01]
Ooh that's gonna cut through
the air really nicely.

[00:23:25.02]
And when you fly this, you're
going to put your thumb,

[00:23:31.06]
right underneath there.

[00:23:35.04]
All right, so there's my thumb.

[00:23:37.03]
And then my hand, the rest of my fingers

[00:23:40.00]
are gonna go inside here.

[00:23:42.03]
So this is how you hold it.

[00:23:47.03]
All right, so that little notch,

[00:23:49.06]
in between the two mountaintops,

[00:23:51.05]
that fits right in this part of your hand,

[00:23:54.07]
hand fingers on the inside,
thumb on the outside.

[00:23:58.07]
And the way you fly this
is --  it's gonna glide.

[00:24:03.05]
So you just sort of do this
and let it go in that motion.

[00:24:08.08]
And again, this ring, which
has more folds of paper

[00:24:12.01]
is gonna cut through the
air a little bit better.

[00:24:15.02]
And then the two little mountaintops,

[00:24:17.08]
those kind of act like the wings.

[00:24:19.09]
(drum rolls)

[00:24:22.05]
(upbeat music)

[00:24:47.03]
Poetry Corner.

[00:24:49.07]
This poem is called, "Learning To Fly."

[00:24:53.03]
It's by Ken Nesbitt, from the book

[00:24:56.06]
T"he Biggest Burp Ever, Funny
Poems For Kids," copyright 2014.

[00:25:04.00]
"Learning To Fly."

[00:25:06.09]
I'm soaring, I'm sailing,
I'm learning to fly.

[00:25:12.01]
I'm leaping, I'm bouncing,
I'm high in the sky.

[00:25:17.01]
I'm jumping, I'm hopping,
I'm up in the air.

[00:25:21.01]
I'm dashing, I'm diving,
the wind in my hair.

[00:25:25.08]
I'm swiping, I'm whooshing,
I'm light as a kite.

[00:25:30.08]
I'm flittering, fluttering,
floating in flight.

[00:25:36.03]
I'm toppling I'm tumbling, I'm falling.

[00:25:40.01]
I crashed and oops.

[00:25:43.02]
My parents' new mattress is trashed.

[00:25:46.07]
(upbeat music)

[00:25:49.03]