I’m a prairie kid who loves research. I have a Master’s in economics with a focus on public programs, labour and education. Long before that, I did my undergrad in physics & English with a math minor.

Besides my resume, you’ll find this page full of sewing projects, the odd published poem, and stories about Canadian science.

A note about the blog title: in math and physics, the prefix eigen means one's own. It comes from the german, but mostly I always liked thinking about a particle's eigenvalues, and thought I might apply the same thought to my excursions.

Car building

Car building

car-building-screen-cap.png

An activity that works for all ages, with only a few adjustments. Wheels and axles are one of the six simple machines that Renaissance scholars identified studying Greek technology. Complex machines, like cars, are built up of simple machines and other technology to make stuff happen. In this case, our cars take two (or more) wheels and axles, and roll down an inclined plane to get their kinetic energy.

Then again, the kids are mostly just interested in making a car that works, so all the technical fun science stuff can just be slipped in while you show them how to build their first car.

For preschoolers, remember that this is a challenging fine motor skill activity, and while they might need help, let them lead as much as possible. The 8+ kids in my class had very little interest in following along, as usual, so they actually took longer than anyone to figure out how to make this work, but by studying a sample car they eventually all got there on more or less their own.

Supplies:

  • toothpicks/round sticks
  • straws
  • plasticine
  • cardboard, cut into strips (we used egg containers, which gave a lot of variation)
  • tape
  • any other stuff you dream up.

Each car calls for two toothpicks, and two segments of straw cut a bit shorter than the toothpicks.

  1. Tape the straw segments to your cardboard strip. This will hold your axle-wheel combo.
  2. Insert one toothpick into each straw.
  3. Divide modelling clay into four and roll into balls or wheels, depending on motor skills/desired result.
  4. Attach wheels to toothpick axle, being careful not to stick it to the straws as well.
  5. Shape body of the car -- in our case, we folded our longer pieces into car shapes. This is also where a huge amount of invention happened.
  6. Test on an inclined plane. We used a table leaned on a chair.
After the first round of cars were completed, I asked the kids to make a second car and compare how they did. At that point, experimentation and observation takes over.
A car with 8 wheels? Sure. Round wheels? Square wheels? Discovering that you can get rid of the car and just pretend the plane is a slide? Delightful.

 

Kid made game: Baseball Pong

Kid made game: Baseball Pong

Preschool intro to building

Preschool intro to building