If you couldn't guess from all the quotation marks, I had no idea what this event was. This was my third CHaOS Roadshow, where a group of Cambridge science students, ages somewhere between 18 and 30, take about 50 science activities on the road to schools and festivals around the UK for about a month in the summer. So I *got* the activities, the science, the camping, and the fact that basically all of the "demonstrators" (us) would be English, white, younger than me, and very nerdy. Nothing new. What I didn't get was The Scouts.
So 13 of us signed into the camp with our "MPV" (Multi Passenger Vehicle, not to be confused with a MiniBus, which is somehow different) and our huge white "paedo van" (short for "paeodophile"... who apparently drives a white van?) which was full of science equipment and tents and food. We got very official Staff name tags - logical, right? - followed by a "necker" and a "woggle" and a CamJam 2011 "badge". Having never been a Scout, I had no idea what to do with a necker or a woggle or a badge. Everyone else in the camp was wearing their necker tied around their neck, so I tied mine around my neck and immediately got chastised for not rolling it correctly, and "how dare you leave off the Friendship Knot?!" Whoa. What planet was this?
A kind Scout who apparently took the "Scout Promise" to heart rolled my necker for me, tied my Friendship Knot, and showed me how to slide my "woggle" under the knot. I was initiated. (Or so people thought... my favorite quotation from Planet CamJam was a lady asking us "What troupe are you from?", clearly expecting us to answer "Scouts", "Guides", "Beavers", "Explorers", etc, (these are names of scout groups according to the kids' age) and we said "We're scientists". That apparently didn't fit her known categories of scout groups, so she said "What's that?")
I learned lots about scouting ("for God, Queen, and country") and hopefully the scouts learned something about science. I "demonstrated" activities named Cuddly Microbes (cute stuffed toys that represent viruses and bacteria so kids would pick them up and play with them and then read the label and say "That's diarrhea?!" :) Then we'd talk about germs. It was great!), Mini Explosions (lemon juice and baking soda in film canisters so the reaction blows the lid off), Cornflour (cornflour + water makes a really cool sometimes-liquid/sometimes-solid that kids love to stick their hands in and get all over themselves and you), Trebuchets (homemade catapults that the kids can build and test), Suspension Bridge, and, my all-time favorite, Arch Bridge (the kids put together 5 wedge-shaped blocks into an arch bridge and then get to walk over it, while we talk about forces. I just love watching the wheels turn in their heads as they try to cram the blocks together in different ways until they figure out that the short sides all have to point down to make a bridge. I also love their shock and mistrust when I invite them to walk over their new bridge! They always get over that super fast though, and scramble over it like monkeys.).
Me in necker and woggle, and CHaOS uniform t-shirt, on my beloved Arch BridgeAnd look what the Scouts did today! Cooooool.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-14425903
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