National Science Week opened on Saturday, August 15, at the Windale Hub, where Lake Macquarie City Council welcomed makers and inventors, the curious and the clever, for Maker-Con.
Inside the Windale Hub Maker-Con
Designed as a family-friendly, interactive science showcase, the gathering sought to make STEM concepts accessible and motivate kids to try things out, test hypotheses, bounce back from failure, and reconstruct. Science communicator Ben Newsome of Fizzics Education observed that children typically divide into two categories: concrete learners and formal learners.
Newsome watched youngsters interact with various gizmos without dense theory or instructions. He noted that concrete learners are literally trying to figure out how the world works by touching it.
Combat Robotics and Arena Strategy
Inside the battle enclosure, miniature engineering projects clashed for supremacy. Felix Smith, nine, pointed out the battle scars on ‘Bot #1’, his competing machine featuring a bright red trim and a front shovel designed to slip beneath the competition and flip them onto their backs.
The young builder conceded his first bout after a yellow bot cornered and rolled him onto his roof.
Despite early setbacks, Felix examined the wheels and considered how to improve the steering for future rounds. “He’s really good at getting out of traps because he’s tiny,” Felix said.
He noted that lower speeds often grant more control, whereas excessive velocity makes it more likely that a combatant will end up in the pit.
The Mechanics of the Pit
Consisting of a trap door built directly into the floor of the arena, the pit was triggered to open if neither of the competing robots secured a win within a designated timeframe. If a competitor could not be incapacitated, flipped and rendered unable to move, or others brought down, the battles were decided by who survived the pit.
Diffraction Lenses and Astrophysical Scales
Away from the robot arena, visitors engaged with optical physics. Archie Anderson tested a pair of cardboard-rimmed diffraction lenses, watching the flat white light from the ceiling fixtures shatter into a kaleidoscope of colour.
Ben Newsome explained that these lenses are used to divide and measure light into separate wavelengths. Researchers can utilize them to evaluate how far away, where, and in what manner the universe’s most distant stars are moving.
The same light patterns had been used to prove that the universe was expanding.
Bridging Theory and Hardware Engineering
Events like Maker-Con allow participants to tinker with interactive gadgets, experiments and gizmos. By allowing participants to physically handle circuitry, optics, and custom-built mechanics, the initiative encourages children to discover how each item works by picking items up, turning them over, linking them, or taking them apart.
