The Fairy-Land of Science · Lecture I, part 1 · Part 1: Lecture I: The fairy-land of science
1. Fairy tales that are true
Goal: Your child can tell one of Buckley's "true fairy tales" (water caught by the frost and set free by the sun) and say that her "fairies" are the real, invisible forces of nature.
You'll need
- Two ice cubes on two saucers
- A sunny windowsill and a shady spot
- A science notebook (or plain paper) and colored pencils
What's in the book
The opening of the first lecture (pages 1 to 6). Buckley promises "true fairies" and tells three science fairy tales: water spell-bound by frost and freed by the sun (like the Sleeping Beauty), shells so tiny that thousands fit in a walnut-shell, and the spectroscope that can tell gases on the sun. Then she says the forces of nature are her fairies.
The lesson, step by step
Hook question
SayIn fairy tales, a spell can make a whole castle fall asleep. Have you ever seen water that has fallen asleep?
Let your child guess. (Ice! A frozen puddle, icicles, frost on a window.)
Meet the author
Arabella Buckley gave these ten talks to a room full of children in London, in the spring before the book came out, and then wrote them down. She asks you to imagine you are sitting in her audience.
SayShe is going to show us fairies. But they are real ones, and you can find them in your own house.
Read together
Read pages 1 to 4 aloud, up to the end of the fairy tale of the frost and the sun. Stop to look at the pictures in your head.
But I thoroughly believe myself, and hope to prove to you, that science is full of beautiful pictures, of real poetry, and of wonder-working fairies
Look out of the window some cold frosty morning in winter, at the little brook which yesterday was flowing gently past the house, and see how still it lies, with the stones over which it was dashing now held tightly in its icy grasp.
Then sum up the rest of the passage in your own words: tiny sea shells, each the home of a living creature, and an instrument that can tell what the sun is made of.
The idea in plain words
The "frost-giant" is cold. It holds the water still as ice. The "prince" is the sun's warmth, which sets it free again. Nothing magic happens, but it is just as wonderful.
There are forces around us, and among us, which I shall ask you to allow me to call fairies, and these are ten thousand times more wonderful, more magical, and more beautiful in their work, than those of the old fairy tales.
SayA force is a push or a pull, or something that makes things change. We can't see it, but we can see what it does.
Try it: free the sleeping water
Put one ice cube on a saucer in a sunny window and one in a shady corner. Guess which will wake up first. Check every five minutes while you finish the lesson.
Ask: Which fairy freed the water? (The sun's warmth.) Why is the shady one slower? (Less warmth reaches it.)
Tell it back
Your child tells the frost-and-sun fairy tale in their own words. Prompts:
What did the frost do to the brook, the icicles and the window?
Who came to set the water free?
Why does Buckley say this is a fairy tale of nature?
Draw it
In the science notebook, draw two pictures side by side: the brook "spell-bound" in winter, and the same brook running free in the sunshine. Write "Cold" under one and "Warmth" under the other.
Afterwards
Notice it this week: look for water caught by cold (ice in the freezer, frost, a frozen puddle) and water set free by warmth (an icicle dripping, butter softening near a warm stove).
Tip
Buckley calls heat, cold, gravity and the rest "fairies" only as a way of picturing them. She says plainly that they are real forces. Children enjoy the game; just keep saying what the real thing is.
Answers to the book's problems
The frost held the brook still, froze the falling drops into icicles, and froze breath on the window into fern-like patterns. The sun's warmth set the water free. It is a fairy tale of nature because it is as wonderful as a fairy tale but really happens, made by invisible forces.
Worked out for this site from the scan. If a number in your copy differs, trust the book.