TRANSCRIPT

Kids: Hey Ms. Barnes.

Woman: Hi.

Girl1: Hi, I'm Bianca and this is Jacob and Matthew. Doctor D told us that we needed to learn more about the scientific method. It might help us solve the problem of stink invading the town of Fuseville. We were hoping you could help us.

Boy1: Wow. Look at this place. Hey, this doesn't look like a lab. This looks like a plane.

Boy2: Are you a scientist?

Woman: Well, not exactly. Let me ask you something. Have you ever heard of an engineer?

Boy1: An engineer? Isn't that someone who drives a train, designs, or invents something?

Woman: That's correct on all accounts. I'm an electronics engineer and we use math, science, and principles of electronics in order to help us with our flying laboratory.

Boy2: A flying laboratory. What do you mean by that?

Woman: Come on kids. Let me show you how it works.

Woman: Our plane is more like a computer lab with lots of electronic equipment and aircraft systems. In here we even have a real cockpit, just like normal planes.

Boy2: I'd like to be a pilot one day. Woman: I'm sure you will. Maybe you will even fly this plane.

Boy2: Cool.

Woman: We have several experimental stations in our plane which are all tied together in a network. They work together to help us collect data while we're flying and landing. The type of data we collect depends on the type of research we are conducting. Get it?

Girl1: Yes. But how do you use the scientific method on your job?

Woman: Well the first thing we do using the scientific method is to identify a problem. Right?

Kids: Right.

Woman: Well the second thing we do when using the scientific method is to collect data related to the problem by changing certain variables.

Boy1: What are variables?

Woman: Variables are just changes. We change one or more things, one at a time and then we measure the results of that change.

Boy2: How are you going to do that?

Woman: During the winter season, we are going to take the airplane to a very cold place, like up in Michigan near the great lakes, and land it on a very long runway. Then we will test the plane by landing it on a runway it takes once the brakes are applied to stop the plane. This tells us how much friction we have on the tires. It's just like taking your bicycle and stopping it on ice or snow instead of on a dry smooth road.

Woman: We'll test at least four variables in our experiment. A dry surface, a wet surface, icy surface and a snowy surface. Let me show you how we look at some of our data.

Woman: We can observe all of the different camera views at the video station. These computer generated graphics displays help us see how the airplane is traveling down the runway.

Boy1: Wow. Cool pictures.

Woman: It can handle millions of bytes of data all at once. This represents the data collection part of the scientific method. And the results come out in a pattern of numbers that the researchers can use to tell how the tires reacted with the runway surface.

Girl1: Awesome! What do we do next?

Woman: Next we take the data we collected and analyze it in order to help us solve our runway friction problem.

Woman: We can use what we find from analyzing the data to make better runways and landing gear to help our planes to land more safely during bad or inclement weather. This is the way that we help make our airplanes and airports safer for you and me.

Woman: So this is how we use the scientific method on our Boeing 757 research laboratory out here at the NASA Langley Research Center. Now that we've shown you first... how to identify a problem. Next to collect the data by changing certain variables. Maybe you can use this method in order to solve your problem with the stink.

Girl1: Yes. I think we should think about our variables for the investigation of stink.

Boy1: The stink.

Boy2: And variables.