[600] in Humor
HUMOR: Science from kids' perspective
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (abennett@MIT.EDU)
Sat Dec 10 22:34:19 1994
From: abennett@MIT.EDU
To: humor@MIT.EDU
Date: Sat, 10 Dec 1994 22:30:24 EST
Date: Fri, 9 Dec 94 12:48:40 PST
From: Connie_Kleinjans@Novell.COM (Connie Kleinjans)
From: "Jim Pellmann" <jgp@Rational.COM>
Forwarded mail from Don Murray <dmurray@unidata.ucar.edu>
Subject: Kids and science
Beguiling ideas about science quoted here were gleaned from essays,
exams, and classroom discussions. Most were from 5th and 6th graders.
They illustrate Mark Twain's contention that the 'most interesting
information comes from children, for they tell all they know and then
stop.'
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You can listen to thunder after lightning and tell how close you came to
getting hit. If you don't hear it you got hit, so never mind.
Rainbows are just to look at, not to really understand.
While the earth seems to be knowingly keeping its distance from the
sun, it is really only centrificating.
South America has cold summers and hot winters, but somehow they still
manage.
Most books now say our sun is a star. But it still knows how to change back
into a sun in the daytime.
Water freezes at 32 degrees and boils at 212 degrees. There are 180 degrees
between freezing and boiling because there are 180 degrees between north and
south.
Some people can tell what time it is by looking at the sun. But I have never
been able to make out the numbers.
In looking at a drop of water under a microscope, we find there are twice as
many H's as O's.
Clouds are high flying fogs.
I am not sure how clouds get formed. But the clouds know how to do it, and
that is the important thing.
Clouds just keep circling the earth around and around. And around. There is
not much else to do.
Water vapor gets together in a cloud. When it is big enough to be called a
drop, it does.
Humidity is the experience of looking for air and finding water.
We keep track of the humidity in the air so we won't drown when we breathe.
Rain is often known as soft water, oppositely known as hail.
Rain is saved up in cloud banks.
A blizzard is when it snows sideways.
A hurricane is a breeze of a bigly size.
A monsoon is a French gentleman.
Thunder is a rich source of loudness.
Isotherms and isobars are even more important than their names sound.
It is so hot in some places that the people there have to live in other
places.
The wind is like the air, only pushier.
