Inspiration
Floating balls over a wind sources are a staple of hands on science museums and kids science books.
Materials
Ping pong ball
Electric hair-dryer with cool air setting (don't want to melt the ball)
Toilet paper tube or paper towel tube
Notes
The setup couldn't be easier for this one as all you do is point he hair-dryer up and set it on high speed with cool air and have the kids drop the ball in to the flow and enjoy. It helps to illustrate the power of the Bernoulli principal effect here if you not only show how it can make the ball hover with the dryer pointed up but also at an angle so that the ball is clearly hovering to the side of the blower so it's obvious that it's not just wind "pushing up". After they've had a change to play with how the laminar air flow traps the ball in various ways add the tube from above the ball and watch the ball shoot out of the top at a decent clip.


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