Mindball and Oscylinderscope (Julianna and Sam)

Mindball-

When I facilitate mindball I often start by watching the guests play the game. I find by just being available to the guests they often will start asking me questions about how to play the game and how the game works. When asked how to play the game, I respond with press the button to begin, place your forehead on the headrest and relax. Afterwords, we have a conversation about what happened and I ask for their hypothesis on how the ball is being moved. Pulse, pressure, concentration, are all responses I get often. If its something they can test, I encourage them to test their hypothesis. I also encourage them to look at the graph and hypothesize what the graph is showing. After the guests are able to make predictions and test some hypothesis, I explain that mindball is measuring alpha waves which are associated with relaxation. With this information, guests often want to run new experiments with the game.

Oscylinderscope-

I feel that modeling behavior is a big part of getting people to experiment with the oscylinderscope. I will often stand and play with the oscylinderscope to draw peoples attention. This usually results in someone coming over and observing me and I encourage them to come test it out. I continue to ask them what more they can do with it and help them explore all of the parts. I ask questions like what do you think this is showing? Why do you think it looks different at different speeds/push down he peddle? To encourage them to a higher engagement level I often give challenges such as seeing if they can change the shape of the strings, make the strings change direction, or simply encouraging them to keep playing and exploring which is often how you discover new things about an exhibit!