Contact: Maridith Geuder
Activities and exhibits illustrating everything from planks to plywood to pulp and papermaking are part of the fifth annual Wood Magic Science Fair.
The Oct.11-15 event at Mississippi State is expected to attract nearly 8,000 third and fourth graders and their teachers. The university's Forest Products Laboratory/Forest and Wildlife Research Center sponsors the program with support from wood products industries.
Designed to illustrate the importance and uses of an abundant natural resource, Wood Magic was born of a third-grade field trip to the Forest Products Lab some half-dozen years ago. Providing hands-on educational activities to about 60 classes of students each day, presentations continue to introduce children to the impact of the forest industry in their state.
Major activities include:
--A portable sawmill that turns rough logs into lumber and helps introduce such terms as heartwood, sapwood and residues.
--"Wood sandwiches" to illustrate how plywood is made.
--Furniture testing, including computerized evaluations of cushions and frames.
--Talking computers that both "speak" with visitors and provide instructions for a router to cut designs.
--"Bubbling bazookas" that transform small oak billets into bubble blowers and illustrate the density, hardness and permeability of wood.
--Papermaking.
For more information, contact Dan Seale or Amy Garrard at (662) 325-8453.