Teaching Children Some Physics, the Healthy Way
We are finding a lot of things are being moved around the garden these days.
It all started with my aim to create games for our children that would teach them something useful while they played in the open air.
The current problem arose from learning the advantage of the lever to move heavy objects.
This is a simple enough device.
We tied some rope near the end of a pole and tied the other end to and old car tyre.
By digging the end of the pole into the ground it was possible to use it as a lever to pull the tyre along.
The tyre in question was too heavy for junior to move by himself but with the help of a lever he found new strength! Needless to say he wanted to try this out on other objects and so we found the lawnmower had apparently moved to the other side of the garden on its accord.
The dustbin was also not where we expected it.
This last one fell onto its side, which was not popular with the family.
However, this resulted in junior behaving responsibly and putting the garbage back into the bin.
Clearly it is time to learn about the centre of gravity of dustbins - and the stability of all objects that are taller than they are wide like glasses of water that are tall and slender.
I am not deterred by these unexpected results to our experiments in childhood education.
In my view there is much to be said for encouraging our children to play in the open air away from the computer games that would otherwise occupy their time.
There are of course numerous opportunities to teach them useful techniques that they can apply at other times.
Teaching physics by practical experiences is a much better way than by then writing symbols on a black or white board.
One of the unexpected outcomes has been the competition with other children.
If they both have a pole then the rope can be tied to both poles and you have form of tug-of-war where they learn the importance of the height of the rope along the pole and can pitch themselves against bigger children with a judicious placing of the rope on their pole.
I almost forgot to mention another aspect.
The more leverage that is applied the less force is required but the shorter the movement of the object..
So to coin a phrase from our other activities: what you gain on the swings you lose on the roundabouts.
He has learned that the work performed is force multiplied by distance.
It all started with my aim to create games for our children that would teach them something useful while they played in the open air.
The current problem arose from learning the advantage of the lever to move heavy objects.
This is a simple enough device.
We tied some rope near the end of a pole and tied the other end to and old car tyre.
By digging the end of the pole into the ground it was possible to use it as a lever to pull the tyre along.
The tyre in question was too heavy for junior to move by himself but with the help of a lever he found new strength! Needless to say he wanted to try this out on other objects and so we found the lawnmower had apparently moved to the other side of the garden on its accord.
The dustbin was also not where we expected it.
This last one fell onto its side, which was not popular with the family.
However, this resulted in junior behaving responsibly and putting the garbage back into the bin.
Clearly it is time to learn about the centre of gravity of dustbins - and the stability of all objects that are taller than they are wide like glasses of water that are tall and slender.
I am not deterred by these unexpected results to our experiments in childhood education.
In my view there is much to be said for encouraging our children to play in the open air away from the computer games that would otherwise occupy their time.
There are of course numerous opportunities to teach them useful techniques that they can apply at other times.
Teaching physics by practical experiences is a much better way than by then writing symbols on a black or white board.
One of the unexpected outcomes has been the competition with other children.
If they both have a pole then the rope can be tied to both poles and you have form of tug-of-war where they learn the importance of the height of the rope along the pole and can pitch themselves against bigger children with a judicious placing of the rope on their pole.
I almost forgot to mention another aspect.
The more leverage that is applied the less force is required but the shorter the movement of the object..
So to coin a phrase from our other activities: what you gain on the swings you lose on the roundabouts.
He has learned that the work performed is force multiplied by distance.
Source...