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Like all of you, I'm a number of things to a number of people...Navy wife, homeschooling mama, educated woman and aspiring writer. Read my thoughts on all of it here. Please feel free to leave your thoughts on all of it too!

Monday, November 1, 2010

Simple Machines Unit Review

We started talking about simple machines a few weeks ago.  I expected it to be a two week unit.  However, life got in the way and we're just finishing it this week.  Most of last week we studied Halloween and connected holidays (more about that in the next review).  Back to simple machines...

We got the following books from the library:

Ancient Machines: From Wedges to Waterwheels, Michael Woods and Mary B. Woods
First Science Experiments: Mighty Machines, Shar Levine and Leslie Johnstone
Experiments With Simple Machines, Salvatore Tocci
Starting With Science: Simple Machines, Deborah Hodge

The last three books covered a lot of the same material and had similar experiments in them.  There were several we didn't do, but we did have some fun with levers, pulleys, inclined planes, and wedges. 


Sorry, I didn't take many pictures this go 'round.  Aside from experiments and reading we also added several words to our growing dictionary.  Aunt Mary suggested that we build a Rube Goldberg machine, but we didn't.  Jace would have loved it, but I'm not ready for that yet.  Perhaps in a year or two.  We did talk about them, though, and look at some of them here.  I was going to have Jace fill out this around the house worksheet, but he naturally did it on his own, without me supplying him with blanks to fill in.  I still think it's a great tool, though.  Maybe you can use it! 

And, that's about it, folks.  We really enjoyed this unit, especially learning about the difference periods of history all over the world.  I, for one, had no idea that the Stone Age was at different times for different cultures...I guess you learn something new every day, especially when you're a teacher.

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