My husband, Rob, and I are doing a program for a local elementary school. The librarian wants to implement "Five Minute Science Stations". This afternoon, Rob and I worked with a fifth grade class to test the program with catapults, hot wheels, and CD spinners. The idea is for the fifth graders to test an idea and develop a video for their peers. Other students can watch the video and replicate the experiment. We used a launcher and track to teach speed. It took a bit to convey the idea of speed and have the kids determine how to measure speed with Hot Wheels. We did the same thing with craft stick catapults and CD spinners.
Hot Wheels took a bit of time. Eventually, the kids were able to use an iPad as a timer and understood to take a least three measurements to average. We even talked about the problem with reaction time and timing the speed, as well as converting feet per second into miles per hour. With the catapults, we emphasized angle and distance. As to the CD spinner, I showed the kids a few optical illusions and gave them CD patterns to color. Here are the photos.
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