SUNDRE – More than three dozen students at River Valley School recently donned their thinking caps as they individually or in teams of two researched a topic of their choice and conducted experiments during the annual science fair.
Among them was Adara Myhr, Grade 4, whose keen curiosity about rainbows inspired her project, called The Secret Life of Rainbows, to learn how light refracts to create them in certain atmospheric conditions.
“I’m just really interested in rainbows because I like the colour of them, how many shapes and sizes they can be in, and how many colours they have,” said Myhr on Thursday, Feb. 12 at the school’s gym where all the projects were set up on display for a panel of judges to review prior to public viewing.
She used prisms, a mirror with water, as well as natural light from the sun and even a flashlight and a phone light to learn more about the colour spectrum and how rainbows form in the atmosphere given certain conditions.
Along the way, Myhr said she learned that there exists lots of different kinds of rainbows.
“There can be quadruple rainbows, moonbows, lunar rainbows, triple rainbows and then double rainbows,” she said.
Moonbows manifest when the moon’s light refracts with mist or water droplets at night, and a lunar rainbow occurs when moonlight crosses paths with ice crystals, she said.
“A lunar rainbow is almost white and very rare to see, like the moonbow,” said Myhr, whose project ended up placing first in her grade.
Isabelle Brink, Grade 5, decided to study the safety of ATVs in a project called Is It Safe? after experiencing a close call on an off-highway vehicle.
“I rolled a quad a few weeks ago and I wasn’t wearing a helmet, and I fractured my elbow and my collar bone,” said Brink.
She presented some history about ATVs along with safety tips and had conducted an experiment designed to test the resiliency of helmets.
Her research also involved digging up statistics that indicate thousands of Canadians are admitted to emergency rooms throughout the country every year due to ATV collisions, and that many are fatal.
But Brink said she’s not scared to get back on an ATV once she’s recovered. However, she has no plans to operate one without a helmet on.
Among the volunteer judges from the community were some members of council, retired teachers and a couple of members from the Sundre RCMP detachment.
Students who placed in the top have been invited to attend the Mountain View Science and Technology Fair on Saturday, Feb. 28 in Olds.
Science fair results
First place
Grade 1: Brinley Melin – Which liquids mix best with water?
Grade 2: Sawyer and Miller Forster – Slinky Sleuths
Grade 3: Kaidynce Kramer and Liv Rudniski – Raining Fireworks
Grade 4: Adara Myhr – The Secret Life of Rainbows
Grade 5: Everly Neale – Will it Eat?
Grade 6: Start Juke – What is aerodynamics?
Second place
Grade 1: Blaire McQuiston – Rainbow Density Tower
Grade 2: Delia Ritchie – The Great Ice Race
Grade 3: Sawyer Pettie and Jack Brenneis – How to start the best campfire?
Grade 4: Heili Weerasekara – Hydraulic Operated Bridge
Grade 5: Everly Zinter – The Five Second Rule
Grade 6: Maeve Petersen and Lennon Mcintosh – Which burns faster, coloured or white candles?
Honourable mentions
Grade 2: Claire Power – Rainbow Trout
Grade 3: Maisie Reicker – The Oobleck Mystery
Grade 4: Blaise Tucker and Averie Power – A Butterfly’s Life
Grade 5: Katelyn Hope – Can humans detect AI-generated images?
Grade 6: Wyatt Mcleod – Pine Needle Sprite