Sci-Tech games make learning a plaything

John Millwater could be seen adjusting and tinkering with the wooden creations around The Coordination Station just as much as the adolescents half of his height. The handmade, wooden thinking games are a permanent part of the Sci-Tech Discovery Center, which officially opened its doors last Saturday at the Frisco Discovery Center.

As all ages of visitors played, pulled, prodded and plucked at the various stations, delight filled Millwater’s eyes. The inventor said he could not have felt anything more satisfying than when he walked in to the child’s dream land and saw that every one of his games was occupied with a player.

“Most people need food, water and air, but this is what keeps me going,” Millwater said. “To me, it’s just remarkable. I’m the most surprised when the kids like them.”

Jessica Rush / Staff Photo: Inventor John Millwater handmade the wooden science toys for The Coordination Station, a permanent display at Sci-Tech in Frisco.

Having worked in nuclear power for 27 years, Millwater said the ideas for new games just come to him as he is working in Florida.

“Typically when I’m building, I think of five more,” he said.

Millwater, a Nobel Prize nominee, got the idea to start constructing games that teach scientific principals when he went to watch a Special Olympics competition. He noticed the athletes were roasting in the hot sun as they waited to compete, and after much encouragement he convinced their coaches to let them play with the games he built underneath the bleachers. The mind benders were entertaining and offered a relief from the weather.

Noticing the games’ popularity, Millwater began to bring them to Children’s Hospital in New Orleans, a tradition he repeated every month for the next 15 years.

Now, those same types of imaginative games are being enjoyed at Sci-Tech, and many have a story to accompany them.

For example, Millwater explained that a wooden box with a clear lid, holding moving marbles and stationary bells, was designed for a disfigured little girl of a colleague. As the girl lifted the handles of the box to hear the wonderful music the bells made when the marbles slid past and bounced off of them, she also was building shoulder muscles to help her posture.

Learning physics principals while playing does require a good amount of noise, but chairman of the board for Sci-Tech Charlyn Plunk explained that the center was constructed with sound dampening technology, ensuring sound does not bleed over into the other spaces.

Along with The Coordination Station, a temporary Math Midways exhibit will be on display until Jan. 16. Various booths teach the scientific principles behind fair games. The Ring of Fire teaches about refraction and light, and the Harmonograph exhibits the principles of oscillation and symmetry while giving children the chance to take home their artwork.

Pedal on the Petals was a popular game for children and adults. A bicycle made with square wheels of varying sizes demonstrates the “catenary” principle, and a yellow flower with specially-designed petals provides the perfect surface for riding the bike that would otherwise go nowhere.

“I think it’s really cool,” Olivia Madden, a fifth grader at Fisher Elementary, said. “It’s really fun, and I could do them over and over again.”

Madden said she would bring her friends and could see herself coming to the center once or twice a week. Sci-Tech does have family memberships, which include free admission to the Sci-Tech Discovery Center, early registration for camps, and discounts among other benefits.

Sci-Tech has a couple of rooms that split off from the main area that can be used for small groups. The i-space room can be sectioned into two areas for group projects and activities with an assigned educator. A WOW Lab allows volunteers to interact with students, giving them experiments they can take home like Magic Sand or Hoopsters that teach aerodynamics.

Most groups will start at the Discovery Stage, another area for experiments. The stage will regularly feature preschool story time at 10 a.m. Tuesdays – Fridays, cow eyeball dissections at 2 p.m. on Saturdays, and the making of liquid nitrogen ice cream at 2 p.m. on Sundays. A more detailed list of camps, home school activities, birthday party information and weekly themes can be found at www.mindstretchingfun.org.

Sci-Tech will partner with Cartoon Network for their next temporary exhibit that will run from the end of January to the end of May, where children will learn the science and technology behind making cartoons.