Kids love this shit as long as you keep it at the ELI5 level and stop when they are done and lose interest. My kid will throw around words like “microorganism” and “bioaccumulation” because I actually explain biology concepts when he asks. The other day he had a question about atmospheric composition and he was absorbed for about 5-10 minutes, complete with looking at molecular diagrams, and then he was done and went off to make his Lego people fight each other with flamethrowers.
If you have knowledge, share it with kids and let them see you enjoying science. They absorb more than you might think.
Whenever I try this my kid will go “dad, please stop talking” and go back to his Legos immediately. Guess I need to work on my teaching skills.
Haha I have one of these.
Them: how come most trees are green?
Me: Oh, well the leaves have s…
Them: OK goodbye
I also have another one that likes to hear all the details, and as a young kid they would ask me to explain stuff while they fell asleep.
Me: OK, sleeping time
Them: Can you tell me why we don’t two suns while I lie down?
Me: oh, boy, well… [then I talk until they fall asleep]
I think they were about 3 or 4 when we did this.
I recently taught my 11-year-old nephew “how planes fly.” A bit oversimplified, of course, but words like camber and lift and circulation were tossed around along with Bernoulli’s principle.
I’ve heard that Bernoulli’s principle is not that important for how planes fly.
Yes, there’s a bit of a myth around Bernoulli’s principle (faster moving fluids have lower pressure) and how much it matters for lift in plane wings. It came up in the conversation because I was trying to describe what air pressure is in general, and made an analogy to a pan flute (he plays flute in band).
Disclaimer: I’m an aerospace engineer, but I do not claim to be an expert on topic.
But for plane wings, the myth is really that the air above the wing moves faster because the curved surface is longer. That’s pretty much dead wrong, but is still in tons of textbooks. The air above the wing does move faster, but it’s because of a bunch of complicated physics that to be honest, I don’t really understand any more. I may have even been taught wrongly in college. But the result is that there is a velocity difference on a cambered wing even when it’s flat, and thus Bernoulli’s principle does apply, and there is a pressure difference giving you lift.
But that speed difference is mostly important at cruising altitude, when the wings aren’t angled, and it’s positively correlated with airspeed, so the thrust matters way more. When you’re climbing, the angle matters more. The camber (curvature) of the wing, the airspeed, and the angle of attack all lead to that pressure difference, along with a few other things like circulation, which is also caused by a sharp edge at the back of the wing. But everything kind of works together to generate that pressure difference and hence the lift that can combat gravity. It’s actually pretty hard to try and dumb it down without saying things that aren’t wrong.
This is fascinating, thank you. I understand that Bernoulli’s principle is involved, but it is not the sole nor even the most important factor in fixed-wing aircraft flight (if I’m using terms properly), and you’ve added some interesting context.
I give you my gratitude, and also my belief that you sound like an awesome sibling-of-a-parent to your nephew.
Discussing it properly is fine as long as they are interested. If they don’t seem interested, then you can boil it down to a simpler analogy. Some kids very much appreciate having the full picture right away, and some need a framework first before details can be added. Most schools use method 2, because it will eventually reach all kids, and the only downside is kids that need/want method 1 will be bored the whole time.
I love and cherish that moment when I can trap my youngest family members with simple answers that turn into this after they ask follow-up questions
Feynman answering “Why is ice slippery”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36GT2zI8lVA
Why are you not disturbed by the fact that when you push down on a chair it pushes you back?
