Girls learn about engineering, science and math at GEMS Camp

About a dozen girls, between the ages of seven and 12, learned about engineering, science and math at the GEMS Camp, held Monday to Friday at the Whitney Crawford Community Centre in Tiverton.

Led by Dana Nguyen of Toronto, the girls studied engineering Tuesday, building tower structures from drinking straws and tape. Wednesday, they learned about bone structure and the human skeleton. Thursday, they learned about pollution and water filters. And Friday, they did tessellations - repeated patterns and shapes - and origami, and then held an open house for their families and friends, to end the camp.

Joining Nguyen, were volunteers Priya Kalra of Kincardine, Nadia Nguyen of Toronto, Josie Berry of Port Elgin, Diya Parikh of Port Elgin, Cydney Morris of Port Elgin and Charlotte Berry of Port Elgin.

Each day, one of the volunteers would conduct a Science Magic experiment for the girls. Thursday, Josie Berry filled a plastic resealable bag with water and then shoved a pencil into it and nothing leaked. She explained that the bag is made of polymers which are stretchy and will gather around the pencil, keeping the water inside, provided the pencil stays in the bag.

The girls then tried it for themselves and were excited by the results.

From there, they gathered around a container of water which represented the Potomac River in Washington. Each girl had a glass with a "pollutant" in it, such as dirt from construction sites, fertilizer from fields, oil from a garage, etc. As Dana Nguyen read a story about how the river became polluted, each girl tossed in the contents of her glass, until at the end, the water was so dirty that they all agreed they would not drink it.

Which led to the discussion about, and creation of, homemade water filters.