Stereo Boom Microscopes

A stereo boom microscope is a great gift for any child, boy or girl, old enough to ask how things work. It can stimulate mind growth and develop his skills in observation and analysis. But as this isn’t just any toy, make sure to guide your child in his first few forays with his stereo boom microscope and ensure that he’ll derive maximum pleasure from it later on.

A Guide to Teaching Kids on How to Use a Stereo Boom Microscope

Step 1 Explaining What a Stereo Boom Microscope Is
Your child will display a stronger sense of responsibility to using a stereo boom microscope if you can explain to him what it is and what it can do. Make sure that he understands the small but important differences between stereo boom microscopes and other types of optical microscopes. Explain to him as well why a stereo boom microscope can function mostly at low power magnification and able to produce three dimensional images when other types of microscopes can’t.

Step 2 Assembly
Some stereo boom microscope sets do not come fully assembled. Some would require you to manually attach the boom stand to the stereo microscope first. This is not a safe task to assign to a child, but if your child indicates willingness to help you then by all means, accept it and just entrust him with small but harmless jobs such as picking up screws or reading the instructions from the user manual.

Step 3 Choosing a Work Station
Assuming that your child isn’t old enough to take good care of fragile equipment like this in outdoor activities, it’s best to assign him a work station where he can use the stereo boom microscope in relative comfort and safety. You don’t need to give him one whole room, but it must be a place where he can enjoy peace and quiet if necessary. It must also have good lighting conditions and a table for which he can put his observations into writing. Consider the boom stand type – some are designed for desktop use while others come as floor stands – when looking for a good working environment for your child.

Step 4 Switching On the Stereo Boom Microscope
If your stereo boom microscope is battery-powered, this is a good time to teach your child how to properly install and remove batteries. Remind him to keep in mind safety precautions when moving the stereo microscope lest he end up damaging it. Emphasize how costly it is to have the stereo microscope to repair so he’ll understand why it requires extra careful handling.

If your stereo boom microscope is electrically powered, it would be up to you to decide if your child is old enough to plug in equipment by himself. If you think he is, just give him the usual reminders and warnings regarding plugging and unplugging electrical equipment.

Step 5 Preparing the Specimen
The great thing about stereo microscopes is that you no longer have to go through tedious procedures of preparing specimens or samples to view them properly. You’ll rarely even have to work with oil immersion lenses. Overall, you just have to teach your kid to take small thin sections of a sample so that it would fit the glass slide provided with the stereo microscope. Remind him to position it at the center to make it easier for you to focus on it later on.

Step 6 Adjusting for Magnification and Clarity
For this step, it’s time to teach your kid about eyepieces and objective lenses. This is also where you explain to him how light, or better yet, its reflection, is able to produce magnified images of the sample. Clarify the different roles objective lenses and eyepieces play and how they come together in the end to produce the total magnification grade for your stereo microscope. If you have provided your child with a selection of eyepieces and objective lenses, teach him the rudiments of selecting the right equipment to match the type of sample he’s studying.

Furthermore, teach him how to use the coarse and fine adjustment knobs and the difference between the two.

Step 7 Adjusting Light
Stereo boom microscopes may or may not use a built-in light system. It may use an iris or disc diaphragm. It will definitely come with a condenser. In any case, it’s important to teach your kid what role each part plays and how it’s terribly important not to change their specifications as much as possible. Let them worry about that when they get older and become more careful.

Step 8 Taking Notes
Last but not the least, teach them how to build memories they can look back to. Teach them how to label slides and record their observations. Keep your kid’s notes for him. He’s sure to appreciate them when he gets old. 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 15th, 2008 at 7:06 am and is filed under stereo boom microscopes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.