I had the sincere pleasure of helping the girls of the Brownie troop at my daughter's school earn their Aviation Badge. There was a lot to prepare (for me), I wanted to introduce them to what I love and maybe interest them in flying or perhaps one of the sciences involved in flying. The challenge was to keep the interest of a group of 8yr olds and not talk beneath their level or over and lose what ever interest they may have had. There were points where I think I did both but over all I think they had fun and learned a little.
I had a hard time finding the actual packet they had to complete , until I asked a mom and lickety-split I had the booklet. In the meantime I searched the Internet and found
AOPA http://www.aopa.org/path/path.html
99s http://www.ninety-nines.org/aeroed/girlscouts.html
avkids.com http://www.avkids.com/
The Brownies Aviation Try-it packet was in fact the best as it was age appropriate and covered the subjects needed to earn the badge. I did my best to do those items.
The girls came to my work and in the back classroom we discussed Bernoulli's theory using a strip of paper and blowing over it to demonstrate lift. I gave the girls each a sectional and we tried to find the lakes and I answered a lot of good questions about the markings. I handed out the phonetic alphabet and we spelled out words using it. Then in one classroom we have a simulator and the girls came two by two and we looked at the instrument panel and I showed them the controls and how to turn left and right, etc.
We also walked out to the maintenance hanger and looked at planes getting worked on and met the mechanics. After that we walked out to a plane and they all went inside and saw the similarities form the simulator and they had lots of questions!!! As the others waited for their turn they watched some planes in the pattern and at the end, as if planned , a helicopter came in for fuel and it was very impressive for the girls.
I learned a lot from their trip to see me!
