The last time Savannah Bolos flew in an airplane, she wondered — how exactly does it work?

“I always thought being in an airplane, you’d go super fast and like you were traveling at like 500 miles per hour,” the 11-year-old said. “But I remember it felt like nothing — like you’re just sitting in a regular room. I always wondered why.”

On Thursday, Savannah and dozens of other sixth-graders at Waiakea Intermediate School received a 90-minute, hands-on science, technology, engineering and math lesson on the physics of flight.

As part of the lesson, Savannah and her classmates got to operate a remote-controlled, P-40 Warhawk flight simulator and manipulate an airfoil inside a portable wind tunnel to see how different variables can affect lift. They also saw in action Newton’s third law of motion and Bernoulli’s principle — a physics concept that helps explain how airplanes fly.

Waiakea Intermediate is one of a handful of Hawaii Island schools participating this month in the Pacific Aviation Museum Pearl Harbor’s Barnstorming Tour, a STEM outreach education program for sixth-graders.

The Honolulu-based nonprofit started the program in 2008. It’s reached about 26,000 students statewide since then and become the museum’s flagship outreach program.

This month marks its first landing on Hawaii Island. The program plans to connect with more than 500 island students during the two-week visit, which runs through Friday. This week, program staff will visit students at Ka‘u High and Pahala Elementary, Pahoa Intermediate and return to Waiakea Intermediate. The program is funded by a $5,000 Boeing grant and it’s free for the schools.

“We try to teach science in a way that they would otherwise not be exposed to,” said Nick Kann, barnstorming education outreach programs coordinator. “Science and technology is the future. Everything is getting more computerized and automated right down to the airplanes, so that’s why STEM is such a big push.”

“We’re not looking to make 26,000 new pilots — that’d be great if we could — but really we just want to provide a spark in something,” he added. “It doesn’t even have to be aviation-related but just something in science that maybe they otherwise would not have been interested in.”

The barnstorming program is named after a style of stunt piloting performed in the early days of flight to teach the public about aviation. In a similar way, the museum “aims to do the same thing today for sixth-grade students all across the state,” Kann said.

All content aligns with sixth-grade state science standards, he said. Organizers particularly hope to forge interest in STEM and aviation among girls, who are underrepresented in many of those fields.

Kiana Kahele, 11, said she especially enjoyed learning about Newton’s third law of motion. She said science is one of her favorite subjects “because it’s easier than reading and writing and it’s what I’m best at.”

“(The lesson) has really been fun and you get to learn a lot about how things fly and principles and laws,” Kiana said Thursday.

Waiakea sixth-grade science teacher Lisa Mahuna said the STEM lesson also correlated with the sixth-grade physical science curriculum. Mahuna said science standards also are shifting to require students to be able to “demonstrate and apply principles rather than just memorizing and regurgitating the information.”

“And so just by introducing a simple concept to them and through simple activities like flying a remote-control airplane and remembering that feeling of being in an airplane, now they’re thinking, ‘ah,’ and they’re applying that concept,” Mahuna said. “And so rather than just telling them what the idea is, it’s showing them and having them demonstrate it and apply it. So they’re interested and more aware.”

Email Kirsten Johnson at kjohnson@hawaiitribune-herald.com.

The last time Savannah Bolos flew in an airplane, she wondered — how exactly does it work?

“I always thought being in an airplane, you’d go super fast and like you were traveling at like 500 miles per hour,” the 11-year-old said. “But I remember it felt like nothing — like you’re just sitting in a regular room. I always wondered why.”

On Thursday, Savannah and dozens of other sixth-graders at Waiakea Intermediate School received a 90-minute, hands-on science, technology, engineering and math lesson on the physics of flight.

As part of the lesson, Savannah and her classmates got to operate a remote-controlled, P-40 Warhawk flight simulator and manipulate an airfoil inside a portable wind tunnel to see how different variables can affect lift. They also saw in action Newton’s third law of motion and Bernoulli’s principle — a physics concept that helps explain how airplanes fly.

Waiakea Intermediate is one of a handful of Hawaii Island schools participating this month in the Pacific Aviation Museum Pearl Harbor’s Barnstorming Tour, a STEM outreach education program for sixth-graders.

The Honolulu-based nonprofit started the program in 2008. It’s reached about 26,000 students statewide since then and become the museum’s flagship outreach program.

This month marks its first landing on Hawaii Island. The program plans to connect with more than 500 island students during the two-week visit, which runs through Friday. This week, program staff will visit students at Ka‘u High and Pahala Elementary, Pahoa Intermediate and return to Waiakea Intermediate. The program is funded by a $5,000 Boeing grant and it’s free for the schools.

“We try to teach science in a way that they would otherwise not be exposed to,” said Nick Kann, barnstorming education outreach programs coordinator. “Science and technology is the future. Everything is getting more computerized and automated right down to the airplanes, so that’s why STEM is such a big push.”

“We’re not looking to make 26,000 new pilots — that’d be great if we could — but really we just want to provide a spark in something,” he added. “It doesn’t even have to be aviation-related but just something in science that maybe they otherwise would not have been interested in.”

The barnstorming program is named after a style of stunt piloting performed in the early days of flight to teach the public about aviation. In a similar way, the museum “aims to do the same thing today for sixth-grade students all across the state,” Kann said.

All content aligns with sixth-grade state science standards, he said. Organizers particularly hope to forge interest in STEM and aviation among girls, who are underrepresented in many of those fields.

Kiana Kahele, 11, said she especially enjoyed learning about Newton’s third law of motion. She said science is one of her favorite subjects “because it’s easier than reading and writing and it’s what I’m best at.”

“(The lesson) has really been fun and you get to learn a lot about how things fly and principles and laws,” Kiana said Thursday.

Waiakea sixth-grade science teacher Lisa Mahuna said the STEM lesson also correlated with the sixth-grade physical science curriculum. Mahuna said science standards also are shifting to require students to be able to “demonstrate and apply principles rather than just memorizing and regurgitating the information.”

“And so just by introducing a simple concept to them and through simple activities like flying a remote-control airplane and remembering that feeling of being in an airplane, now they’re thinking, ‘ah,’ and they’re applying that concept,” Mahuna said. “And so rather than just telling them what the idea is, it’s showing them and having them demonstrate it and apply it. So they’re interested and more aware.”

Email Kirsten Johnson at kjohnson@hawaiitribune-herald.com.