Making a brain bending whirligig!

This super fun brain bender is brought to you by our amazing 50 Science Things to Make and Do. We come back to this book time and time again. There are so many fun activities with fun outcomes that take very little prep. You can find out more about this fun title HERE.

Whirligigs are great fun for kiddos of all ages. They don’t take a lot of work to put together, they are fully customizable, and you can even use them to trick your brain!

Materials:

• Card Stock or other sturdy paper
• Jar or cup to make circle outlines
• Scissors, Pen, Markers to decorate your whirligig, glue to put the pieces together, and twine or yarn for twirling.
• Optional: Cardboard to reinforce the whirligig

Begin by using the jar to trace circles for whirligig onto the card stock. We used 2 circles for each whirligig. By gluing the front and back together you get a stronger whirligig.

Next, color your circles! I followed instruction in the book to create a little birdie and a simple cage drawing. But, my kiddos had so much fun creating different creations on their circles!

Now you will glue the front circle to the back circle. Notice that the birdie is right side up but the cage is glued upside down to the back. To make the brain teaser work, the cage has to be upside down! 😁

Note – I reinforced the birdie and cage by sandwiching a piece of cardboard in between to 2 layers of card stock. I did not reinforce the colorful whirligig, so it is only 2 pieces of card stock. Both whirligigs worked very well. However, the reinforced birdie was easier for the younger kiddos to use because it was heavier and easier to twirl.

To reinforce or not to reinforce…. that is the question… 🤣

Next, you will poke or punch 2 small holes on either side of your design. Then, cut a length of twine as long as your arm and loop the twine through the holes as shown. Finally, tie a knot to secure the 2 loose ends of the twine.

Holding the knots you will twist up the whirligig, pull taught, and watch the magic!

Want to see the birdie in action?? Check out this short clip:

Did you see it? The birdie gets caught inside the cage! How does that happen?? Lucky for me – and YOU! – the book explains the phenomenon.

“As the circle spins, your eyes see one picture after the other. The pictures come around so fast that your brain can’t separate them. Instead, it merges the two. So you see one picture – of the bird caught inside the cage.”

So fascinating!

What other creations can you make where something get “caught” inside the other design?? I cannot wait to see what you come up with!

Happy Experimenting!