OMKM brings fun science to Kealakehe Elementary School

The Office of Maunakea Management (OMKM) brought fun interactive learning activities showcasing the science going on at Maunakea to Kealakehe Elementary’s School Science Day. This is the third year that OMKM has participated in the school’s science discovery event for students and parents.

Activities included:

• Learning about native plants and animals at a coloring station.
• Getting an up-close look at the bugs and insects that call Maunakea home.
• Experiencing the motion of mass in space with a fun hands-on demonstration by the ʻImiloa Astronomy Center outreach team.
• Working the joystick of a simulator for drones (unmanned aerial system) with the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo Spatial Data Analysis and Visualization Lab.
• Creating telescope bases out of marshmallows and toothpicks that needed to pass the “shake” test at the Thirty Meter Telescope display.
• Viewing at interactive thermal (heat) imaging demonstration by the W.M. Keck Observatory.
• Watching a early sky viewings demonstration with an interactive light box by Tom Chun of Kahu Kū Mauna.
• Hearing recorded sounds of Native Hawaiian birds with Listening Observatory for Hawaiian Ecosystems.

The Institute for Astronomy also handed out stickers and solar system information.

—An Office of Maunakea Management story