School-Age: Weight and Density

This week we talked about weight (how heavy something is) and density - and how we measure it! 

1. Reading
We read "What Can a Crane Pick Up?" by Rebecca Kai Dotlich. It was a fun tie-in to our discussion/book about weight and measurement because it discussed how many heavy items cranes are able to pick up.

2. Discussion
I asked the kids if they knew what 'weight' meant. Then I began a discussion using the book "Weigh It: Fun With Weight" by Rachel First. The book defines 'weight' as 'how heavy something is'. It also had great discussion points throughout the book. 

One of the pictures showed a little girl weighing apples at the store. I pointed out different types of scales and types of food they might see being weighed at the grocery store. 

I also used the book to point out that, just because something is large (or small), it does not mean that it is heavy (or light). The book used a large beach ball as an example of a large light item and a bowling ball as an example of a small heavy item. 

This led into our activity...

3. Activity
We compared a variety of items, weighing them on a scale my library assistant brought it, that we found around the library. I made up a worksheet that had the items in different columns and they had to circle the item they thought would win each round. 

[The duck was rather humorous as an item to try to fit on the scale - he is one of our large puppets we use for storytimes and he is rather bulky.]

For each round I asked the kids which item they thought was heavier. Then I put each item on the scale and they got to see the numbers fluctuate to show how heavy the items were in grams and ounces. 

4. Craft

The craft we made this week were paper weights. I hinted to the kids that these would make great (belated) Mother's Day presents OR upcoming Father's Day presents.

I pre-painted the rocks before each program and glue-dotted them to a paper plate. That way it was easy to cart it home on its paper plate. 

During the craft time we put out glue dots at the craft tables as well as bowls full of beads, jewels, and googly eyes. The kids could make pet rock monsters or just decorate the rocks as they would like. 

Here are some examples of ones the teens and I made:

One of the teens made a three-eyed rock monster prince:

Another teen made a happy rock:

And I went the punny, creative route:

Notes:

It was a great program this week and went smoothly. I'm glad I listened to my gut and painted the rocks prior to each program. I had almost decided to have the kids do it but, at the last minute, I painted them before the programs. I think it went a lot smoother having me do the messy portion of the craft instead of the kids!

School-Age: Inventions

As part of our summer reading theme (Build a Better World), we learned about inventions this week. Specifically, the inventor of the SUPER SOAKER. Who is going to argue with the fact that the Super Soaker certainly made the world a better place?!

1. Reading
We read the book "Whoosh!: Lonnie Johnson's Super-Soaking Stream of Inventions" by Chris Barton. It was a wonderfully informative book about Lonnie Johnson and the kids enjoyed hearing about an invention that many of them have used (or own!).

2. Discussion
We had a brief discussion about the Super Soaker and Lonnie Johnson. The book was fairly comprehensive, and long, so I did not want to spend much more time talking at the kids. I showed them some real pictures of Lonnie Johnson, since "Whoosh" is mostly illustrations. The best was a picture of his robot Linex that he had won a science competition with!

3. Craft
A. Ideas
The craft was about coming up with their OWN inventions. The first thing I wanted them to do was draw with paper and pencil ideas. They spent about 5 minutes doing so.

B. Prototypes
Then the kids got to make a PROTOTYPE of their invention. I had seen a lot of neat crafts people have done with pool noodles. I decided to lay out a whole mess of craft supplies we have surplus of. We used glue dots and then I put out Popsicle sticks, puff balls, beads and buttons, pipe cleaners, Q-tips, etc.

A few examples that my teen volunteers and I made:

One teen made a space craft that detected liveable conditions on other planets:

Another teen created a robot that sorted clothes: 

A third teen made a single-serve hot pocket oven:

And I made a dishwasher that PUT away the dishes after they were clean: 

Notes:
The kids had a great time (and so did I)! The ones that came to the program earlier in the week were still talking about it to their friends at a Lego program we hosted the next day. The kids LOVED making up their own inventions and bringing them to life with the pools noodles. It was hectic and there were lots of kids, but it was so much fun!

School-Age: Pirates

So, yes, we're discussing pirates this week but we are also learning about the Scientific Method. That doesn't seem to go together, you think? You would be wrong!


1. Reading:
We read "Pirate, Viking & Scientist" by Jared Chapman. Ah, the Scientific Method connection now makes sense! The Scientist cannot figure out why his friends, Pirate and Viking, do not like each other. Throughout the book he tries several experiments to see if he can find a way to make them get along. 

2. Discussion
We talked about the Scientific Method (a brief version of it) and related it back to what happened in the book. We defined "hypothesis", "experiment", "observation", and "results". Jared Chapman has wonderful brief descriptions of each at the beginning of his book. Then we related these parts of the Scientific Method back to what the Scientist did in the book: What were Scientist's hypotheses? What did he do as his experiments? What did he observe? And what were his official results? 

3. Activity
We did a true/false activity next. I handed out true/false sticks - they are Popsicle sticks that have double-sided paper circles on one end. One side is red and the other side is yellow. The kids hold up the red side if they think the statement is FALSE. They hold up the yellow side if they think the statement is TRUE.

The true/false activity was about a variety of facts about pirates and Vikings. 

4. Craft
We made pirate hats based off of the craft I found on the Sand in My Toes blog. I made a template for the front part of the pirate hats. Then I took a legal-sized piece of black construction paper and cut it into thirds for the strip that goes around the backside of the head. For the skulls and crossbones for the front of the hat, I found a clip art picture of one on the internet. 

We used staplers to attach the back part of the hat and measured the kids heads before attaching it in a circle. We let the kids decorate their skulls and crossbones if they wanted, and then they stuck them on their hats with glue dots.

5. Activity
If the kids wanted to know their pirate names before they left for the day, I found a fun 'pirate names' worksheet from the Plucky Momo Blog. They could put their initials on the sheet I gave them and fill in the corresponding pirate name. 


Notes:
This was, all around, a fun program! It worked great to have the pirate name activity as something they did on their own at the end. And the hats were easy enough that the younger kids could do them with a little help and the older kids were not bored. I mean, it was a pirate hat, so it could even be considered somewhat 'cool'. 

School Age: Coding

It's our first week back after taking a break and we talked about coding and computer programming this week!

1. Reading
We read the book "Ada Lovelace: The Poet of Science" by Diane Stanley. It was certainly a longer book but it gave them just enough information about who Ada Lovelace was and what programming a machine means to make it easy for a younger elementary child to understand.

2. Discussion

We had a brief discussion, since the book was so long, about what coding is and how Ada Lovelace, who lived years before what we know as a digital computer existed, was still the first computer programmer. We also talked about coding languages and I showed them examples of binary code.

3. Activity

I explained that, since Ada's first experience was paper code, we were going to do a coding activity on paper as well. I created several different types of mazes (easy, intermediate, and difficult). I had the kids gather around tables and handed them the easy mazes. As a group we used arrows as our 'code' and spent time putting arrows in each block of the maze from start to finish. 

It was a little more difficult for the younger elementary even though my easy coding maze only took 5 steps. However! The parents were pleased at the activity and many of them commented that, although it was harder for their younger kids to do, they loved that it challenged them. 

I offered the more difficult mazes for the kids to take home after the end of the program.

4. Craft

We made keys chains to write the initials of their name in binary code. I created a worksheet that had the kids write each initial of their name in 3 rows. I used the ASCII Binary Alphabet and had the kids fill in the 7 parts of the binary code into the worksheet for each of their initials. I used the ASCII Binary Alphabet from the Little Bins for Little Hands blog.

Then, once the kids wrote their initials in binary code, we made the key chains. I handed them bags that had two different colored beads as well as a key chain ring. The easiest way to get the beads in the correct order was to have the kids place the beads over the binary numbers they wrote on the worksheet. 

After the beads were in order, the kids spent time stringing them onto their key chains. I used blue and white pony beads for them to use as the "1"'s and "0"'s in their binary code. I had red beads left-over from a previous craft that we used to put between the initials to designate where one ended and the next began. 

5. Take Away

As a take-home, since we don't have computers for kids to do digital coding on while they are in the program, I created a list of free websites and/or applications that the kids could learn how to code with. The ones I mentioned were Scratch, Kodable, Lego's Hour of Code, and Hopscotch. But there are tons of different applications and websites to teach kids coding nowadays!

Notes:

It was a little complex for the K-2 crowd but, with a little extra help from our parents, it went well. At the first program of the week we had the kids choose what maze level they wanted to do. That ended up being really hectic and confusing for a lot of the younger kids so I decided at the Friday program that we'd write the code through the maze together. That went much better! 

Also, I attempted to use the stretchy/thin jewelry string in addition to white ribbon (the kids could choose what string to use). The parents and kids were having difficulty using the jewelry string so, in the future, I'd keep from using that material in my programs.