Forcing It

We're in the swing of Force & Motion. I have to admit, I am extremely excited to be discussing forces, energy, motion, and machines. Maybe it is the nerdy science teacher in me! 

I've mentioned before that I want to find a way for students to enjoy their text book.  Next year, I may have to think of a different name for our text to make it sound exciting. Well, today we had to buckle down and take notes. Try not to boo me! Luckily, after stumbling upon blogs and Dinah Zike's resources, foldables have become a constant in my classroom. 

Our big question of the day was, "What are forces?" Instead of having the students take notes and read the text. We did things a little differently. We read the text together and as we encountered a new type of force (i.e. gravity, magnetism, work, power) we defined it underneath its flap. Of course the foldable wouldn't be complete without a little sketch and demonstration. Let's just say, I was throwing things and running around my classroom all day long. 

Thanks to my new SmartBoard bulb, I was able to put the notes on the board and guide the students through each flappity-flap. For being a day full of notes and reading, it was a pretty fun time! I hope the kiddos enjoyed it as much as I did.

Have you taught force and motion? What exciting experiments and demonstrations have you done?

I know have the greatest job on earth, but I think tomorrow I will be applying this philosophy. I'll be the one in a Spiderman costume.