Women of Aviation World Wide Week!

Join Phil Rossoni and myself for a walkalong glider blitz! List of events below!

2200 I<3U walkalong gliders were made for this occasion! 

If you missed all of the events and want a glider, contact me!

Preparation

Friday March 7th, Hub Ottawa, 6th floor, 71 Bank Street, 5pm

We had fun at the Ottawa Hub Winedown this evening.

Saturday, March 8th, Canadian Aviation and Space Museum, 9am

Free ride in a real airplane for girls! The Aviation Museum is a great place for flying. Lots of space and it’s so large it’s never over crowded.

Saturday, March 8th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Women of Aviation Week walkalong glider walkup! Women Of Aviation Worldwide Week. Lot’s of space for flying and making planes! They have added two volunteers to the team to increase capacity.

Sunday, March 9th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Monday, March 10th, Jack Purcell Community Center,  10:30am
Monday, March 10th, Jack Purcell Community Center, 1pm

We did two groups here. An older and a younger group. Wow, what fun. In the younger group I saw the highest rate of adoption of the glider totes.

Reflection

So Phil and I sat down for a beer after the Jack Purcell activity. One thing we noticed was that the gliders were less stable in practice than they were in testing. I decided I would look at it that evening. After some contemplation I am realizing that I used to curl the ballast down and somehow switched to curling them up. I theorize that this is the problem. Curling the ballast up causes a higher center of gravity.

Today I’m going to be doing my first walkalong glider workshop on my own. Here’s what I’m going to do differently:

• Teach people using the Citizen Tumbler then they graduate to the foam glider. This will be more instant since the tumbler takes seconds to make.
• Have an inventory of 5 foam gliders running so people can practice flying them.
• I’m going to pre-crease the gliders for easier folding.

Tuesday, March 11th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Changing the ballast curl downward definitely solved the stability issues. We had a lot of kids today so I increased the focus on the simple paper planes. That was very successful. The kids absolutely love the two designs I was make up some videos on how to make and fly them too.

Wednesday, March 12th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Were getting about 300 kids at these so it’s a little busy at times. It’s pretty easy to deploy some paper planes since it’s a little more instant and the kids love it.

Thursday, March 13th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Friday, March 14th, Canada Science and Technology Museum, 1:00pm

Scalability of the activity has been very helpful. Having the paper planes as well as the walkalong gliders provides more choice and is easier for younger kids. Many of the younger kids also like to decorate the planes.

Another thing I noticed that is very helpful is to find the fastest paths through the activities for fulfillment and gratification. Some things need a bit of work before gratification but I think it’s important to short circuit a bit. For instance instead of having people make the walkalong gliders and then fly them, I’m going to make a fleet of them and have people run around with them for fun. Then make them later. I think it will be more memorable and relevant for them.

I’ll be heading over to the museum early for prep!

Friday, March 14th:Hub Ottawa Winedown, 71 Bank Street, 6th floor at 6-7pm.