WINDHOEK-More than a hundred pupils attended the Nampower annual Science Fair in Windhoek at the SKW hall on Friday.
Learners stood around like peacocks showing their creations to judges explaining what inspired the complicated looking experiments. Fifteen-year-old Indileni Johannes, from the Hanghombe Primary School in the Ohangwena region exhibited a concoction which she claims works wonders for open wounds on animals. She explained that she uses water and the Ombundjambundge plant working it into a paste, which is later used as a lotion for wounds such as snake bites. Johannes said she tested this lotion at her parents’ homestead where she often assists her mother to tend to their animals.
Mia Kittler from the Karibib Private School, also an animal lover, spent days working on her solar system, especially on the sun dial, an exercise that has enabled her to draw a straight line using her free hand. “I always asked my mom a lot of questions, about where the sun goes at night. My mom told me that the sun just puts on pyjamas and then it comes out and then it looks like that (the moon). I later asked her why the stars twinkle at night and she gave me a book to learn for myself,” she explains her interest in the Milky Way.
“I was really struggling at first when I started with the sundial, because I could not draw a straight line. My mom did not want to give me a ruler because she wanted me to learn how to draw a straight line. The sundial helps you to tell time without using a watch, by simply looking at the shadows,” she explains with a smile.
The Science Fair is to encourage the love for science and research amongst young Namibians, explains the Head of the Nampower Foundation, Lucia Hiveluah. “We are not necessarily following up with these projects it is just to instil an interest, however some of the students often continue with their projects turning it into a business,” she says.
John Boshoff, a Grade 8 pupil at the Windhoek Gymnasium has been tasked by his conscience to work on an alternative energy source for people living in shacks.
His project is a power generator comprising a bicycle, motor battery, alternator and a light bulb, an exercise he would like to mass produce for shack dwellers.
“I am originally from Ondangwa and I can see the smoke coming from the shacks not far from our house, and I thought it may be nice to figure out a way to make shacks safer for people in shacks. We hear about peoples’ shacks burning off and lives lost in such fires. With my project they can collect energy for an hour by only stepping on the bicycle for thirty minutes. It is safe and it costs nothing,” he says.
By Jemima Beukes