My wonderful fifth graders plunged into a GLAD (Guided Language Acquisition Design) Force & Motion unit where everything science was embedded with literacy! Students read about force and motion while writing about force motion while speaking about force and motion and listening about force and motion! Phew! That's a lot of force and motion.
Then we came to the week everyone was waiting for: Marble Mazes via Simple Machines! The task was to design and build a marble maze using three of the six simple machines we were learning about. Students picked their partners and began the project by designing a model before building it. We brought in materials like toilet paper rolls, rubber bands, foam noodles, straws, cardboard (in various forms), and so forth.
Students had a whole week to imagine, innovate, and implement their designs! Here's a video that brings that week together with the students' marble maze runs at the end.
How do you let science grow in your classroom? We are looking for more science experiment/project ideas if you are willing to share! Drop a comment below! :)
