Workshop - July 2
After some initial chatting and eating of Chinese food, we kicked off the meeting with a discussion about Community Days. Ron explained that Community Days tends to be a combination of music, booths, food, a petting zoo (!), and people out and about.
discussing Community Days
It seems that setting up a booth for our project would be doable. Our later workshops will help determine what exactly the booth will include.
On to the activity!
We passed out activity cards and asked participants to read through each one before choosing two to work on. The choices were:
- make a radio program
- break a beam of light
- count the trucks
- make a gauge
After a bit of discussion, we split into two groups: one to work on the radio program and one to work on the gauge.
The radio program group spent much of their time planning their script. With a lure to drivers to “tune in for traffic information” the program would then proceed to point out businesses around town, points of interest, air quality, and alternate routes. The group worked hard to decide what information would go where, and how to make it most interesting for drivers who are stuck in traffic and probably not so happy about it!
the radio program group works hard
The program even included a short jingle about the Rankin Bridge, which was well received all around.
The gauge group spent time cutting construction paper, gluing, working with pipe cleaners and felt tip markers. They built an impressive semicircular gauge complete with a canary in a cage to measure air quality as trucks rolled by on Braddock Avenue. As the needle on the gauge moved toward red (bad air quality) the canary would slowly tip over on its perch until it died. A very effective visualization!
lots of cutting and pasting
bad air quality results in a dead canary
Each group shared their projects with each other, generating laughter on both ends. It was fun to see everyone engaged and excited about the end results.
Before leaving, we all headed upstairs to the computer room to look at the blogs and a few other online resources.
in the computer room
We encourage you all to continue checking the blogs and contributing wherever you’d like.