While Natural Sciences was going on, engineering students from UT also came to make toys with electric circuits, similar to the Operatation game!

After coloring pictures of Spongebob Squarepants, Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, and others, young engineers connected wires to  batteries and resistors to create an electric circuit. By touching their tweezers—covered in aluminum foil—to other aluminum foil spots on their game boards, a buzzer would go off and the characters’ noses would light up!

Why aluminum foil? Aluminum foil is a very conductive material. Conductivity is the measure of a material’s ability to conduct electricity. Since aluminum foil is considered a highly conductive material, an electric current can easily pass through it.

Interested in making your own Operation game?

The students provided the instructions for the circuit board, which you can download here.

Things you’ll need:

-Coloring book page or your own illustration

-Cardboard big enough for the illustration

-Aluminum foil

-Tweezers

-9 volt battery holder

-360 ohm resistor (Radio shack)

-Standard LED,  for the light-up nose (Radio Shack)

-Piezo Buzzer (AmericanPiezo.com, #KPI – 2210-L)