Honestly, I’m not sure if I did my Eganized lesson “correctly.” I’m trying to learn more about his model in my freetime, but I’m no expert in this. What I do know is that I used my imagination, I asked the kids to use theirs, and we all had a good time. The tools that I tried to use from Egan’s framework were storytelling, role-playing, emotional engagement, extremes, humor (because honestly, it was a little ridiculous), vivid imagery, riddles, the binary of life/death, and the heroic quality of saving the world from a super-villain. The kids that I gave my lesson to were a homeschool group between the ages of about 6 and 14. I did go through it a little fast and the lesson lasted about 20-ish minutes.

Initially, I was having trouble figuring out how to Eganize the lesson. The first step in creating a lesson using Egan’s framework is to figure out what’s wonderful about it. That part didn’t seem too hard, because photosynthesis is literally the reason why life on Earth exists. Without it, there wouldn’t be plants and the food chain would collapse fairly rapidly. We oxygen-dependent creatures eventually wouldn’t be able to breathe. But what do you do with that? I was stuck. Then, Brandon from Science is WEIRD suggested that I be a super villain with a photosynthesis off button. At 5’2″, I’m not physically very threatening and I smile constantly, so I didn’t think anyone would buy it, but that gave me the idea to pretend like we were trying together to defeat a supervillain with a photosynthesis off button.

I played around with AI and got it to make me a Photosynthesis Off button that turned out surprisingly well. I gathered clue images using both a royalty free website and AI when I couldn’t find what I wanted. I got the idea to make an official looking letter asking us to solve the case that I could pass around. The morning of the lesson, I had the idea to put everything in a manila envelope labeled TOP SECRET. Even my teenager got pretty into it. As we were driving to the lesson, he changed my ring tone to something that sounded very Mission-Impossible-ish and we worked out a code phrase for him to call me at a specific moment at the beginning of the lesson to get the ball rolling.

Overall, I think it went really well. There were around 15 to 20 kids and even the older ones were clearly amused. The feedback I received from my induction mentor was that all the kids seemed very engaged and nearly all of them actually spoke or contributed in some way. It probably helps that these were all homeschool kids that I know to some degree, so they were more or less willing to go along with my nonsense, but I think it’s fair to say we all had a good time and nearly everyone hopefully learned something.

Recommended Age Range: Elementary, Middle School
Time Required: 20 to 30 minutes, plus extra if you want to start a leaf collection
Difficulty: easy, but requires an adult to lead the child or group of children
Cost: Free printable

Materials

• paper or device with screen
• manila envelope (optional)
• cup of water (optional)
• leaf (optional)
• flashlight (optional)

Free Printable

Photosynthesis Lesson – Complete Packet with Instructions

Photosynthesis Lesson – Just the Printables

Instructions

1. PART 1: SET THE SCENE – Print the printables packet or load it up on a tablet or other device if you are using technology to share the clues. If you are printing it out, consider putting all the paper in a manila envelope and writing TOP SECRET on the outside. As you are getting your lesson started and talking to the kids casually, pretend to receive communication from a secret agency. You can either have someone in the audience call your phone and pretend to answer it, or have someone deliver your Top Secret envelope to you, or pretend to receive an important transmission on your device. See the instructions packet for an actual script you can use to introduce the evil Dr. Shrubslayer and the Photosynthesis Off button.
   
   
   
   
   
2. PART 2: PHOTOSYNTHESIS – The next step is to get kids to understand a bit about the chemical reaction that IS photosynthesis. What are the inputs? What are the outputs? Try to think of this as a dialogue. See what the kids already know. Ask them to think about what plants need to grow. If they need help, you can show them the clues. Even if they don’t need help, you can still show them the clues to make more of a visual impact. Photosynthesis needs sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide (what we humans breathe out).
   
   
   
   The outputs are oxygen (that’s an oxygen tank on the scuba diver) and glucose (a type of sugar).
   
   
   
   If you would like to help kids remember this reaction, ask for 3 volunteers, one to be water, one to be light, and one to be carbon dioxide. One child will hold a cup of water and you can stick a leaf in it. Next have another kid shine a flashlight on the leaf, and have the third kid blow on it. Ask everyone to imagine the oxygen coming out of the plant and take deep breathes to breathe it in. Ask them to also imagine it growing very slowly as it uses up the sugar to get bigger.
   
3. PART 3: IMPACTS OF PHOTOSYNTHESIS – Now that they know what photosynthesis is, the students have to decide if they want to help capture Dr. Shrubslayer and stop him from using his Photosynthesis Off machine. (We’re busy people. We can’t stop EVERY super villain that comes to town.) In order to decide whether we want to go to the trouble of helping, we need to know why photosynthesis is important. Again, have a conversation and see what the kids already know. Ask them to think about the inputs and outputs of photosynthesis that we just discovered and what could happen if that reaction was not taking place. Show the visual clues as needed to either prompt an answer or highlight an answer given. The answer are that if there was no photosynthesis, we would all be hungry (talk about how even carnivores rely on plants), the land would be barren, and we would all struggle to breathe.
   
   
   
4. PART 4: CHLOROPHYLL – Hopefully at the end of the last section, the kids will decide YES, it’s important that we thwart the evil plan to end photosynthesis. Now introduce the next part of the role-playing game. Say that a secret code word is required to break into his facility and destroy his device. Thankfully, we have a riddle to help us figure out what the code word is. Again, refer to the Instruction Packet for a suggested script. Present this riddle:
   
   
   
   Use the riddle as a starting point for discussion. Have the kids decipher what the riddle means, line by line. What sort of word are we looking for? Once they figure out that it is a chemical that makes plants green in summer, but goes away in fall, see if anyone knows the word. Whether they do or don’t, show them the visual clues to help them remember the word: a pool for CHLOR, a donut for O, and candy filling for FILL. Chlor-O-Fill –> Chlorophyll
   
   
   
   Once they figure out the secret word, pretend to call it in and act like they have saved the world. They have kept the planet green and alive instead of barren and dead!
   
   
   
5. PART 5: LEAF COLLECTION (optional) – Since the group I did the lesson for was an outdoor nature group (Wild + Free), I wanted to give them something hands-on to do that involved nature. I brought little sheets of paper and crayons and challenged the kids to make leaf rubbings of as many different types of leaves as possible. The younger kids tried it, but at this point the preteens and teens mostly wandered away to socialize, which was fine too.

I hope you have fun learning a bit about photosynthsis in this unconventional way! If you try it out, let me know how it goes!

Related Links

Best Books for Kids
Learning Activities for Kids
Tabletop Games for Kids

The post Imaginative Photosynthesis Lesson appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

Creating these two different cell models is a great place to begin a conversation to notice the differences. Some are very straightforward, like organelles that are in one cell and not the other. For example, the plant cell has green grapes (i.e. chloroplasts) and the animal cell does not. Also, the plant cell has one large water balloon (i.e. vacuole) and the animal balloon has a few small ones.

Other differences are not as obvious. For example, the animal cell uses a round bowl and the plant cell uses a square dish. This is because plant cells tend to be rectangular and animal cells do not. However, if we could have done this demonstration perfectly, we would have pulled the animal cell out of its round bowl after it solidified. (I tried this when my cell was starting to melt a little bit and was unhappy with the result, so I don’t recommend it. It might have worked better if I had done it right after I pulled it out of the fridge.) This is a distinction you will have to explain to your child verbally, maybe just pulling the model out for a few seconds. You can point out that the plant cell has a cell wall label on the glass container and the animal cell does not. You can explain to the kids that animal cells do not have cell walls. It is the cell wall that gives plant cells their rigid rectangular structure.

If you choose to use my plant and animal cell models, it is important to point out while comparing them that the cytosol is actually clear. I used one drop of food coloring in each of my cells to make it easier to tell them apart. I used green for the plant cell since plants usually appear green. However, in reality, cytosol is actually colorless. To be more realistic, we could have left the gelatin clear. You can use this discussion as an opportunity to explain to kids that it is the chloroplasts that give plants their green color.

Recommended Age Range: Kindergarten, Elementary, Middle School
Time Required: ~30 min (plus the time needed to make the plant and animal cells)
Difficulty: Easy — though making the cell models can be time-consuming and requires space in your fridge.
Cost: Free printable. Under $10 in used supplies. I used primarily things we already had in the pantry and fridge, but I did end up buying a small carton of blueberries and a box of gelatin. I recommend switching out items if necessary to avoid buying things if your family won’t enjoy the leftovers.

Materials:

• plant cell model
• animal cell model

Instructions:

1. If you don’t already have plant and animal cell models, please feel free to follow the tutorials for my plant cell model and animal cell model.
2. Have the students examine the two cells and try to determine the differences.
3. Discuss with them the differences they see.

Here are some of the differences they may detect on their own or with your assistance.

• The plant cell has green grapes and the animal cell does not. This is because plant cells have chloroplasts, organelles that contain chlorophyll and convert sunlight into energy in a process known as photosynthesis.
• The animal cell has 2 bundles of spaghetti noodles and the plant cell does not. This is because animal cells have centrioles, while most plant cells do not. Centrioles are used for cell division during an animal cell’s reproduction cycle. Plant cells are able to reproduce without centrioles.
• The animal cell has a few small balloons and the plant cell has one large one. This is because, by the time they are done growing, plant cells typically only have one large vacuole that typically takes up more than half the volume of the cell. Animal cells in contrast may have one or more vacuoles, but they are much smaller in size. Vacuoles are used to store water and food. They also help maintain the pressure within the cell.
• The plant cell has a cell wall label and the animal cell does not. This is because plant cells have cell walls which give plants a rigid structure that allows them to grow upward and outward toward sunlight. Animal cells do not have cell walls. (Note: It would be more realistic if we took away the bowl from the animal cell, but this might be difficult. You could try freezing the animal cell if you wanted to be sure it would maintain its shape.)
• The plant cell is square while the animal cell is round. The reason for this is related to the previous observation. Animal cells only have a cell membrane and not a cell wall, so they are typically round in shape. Plant cells have a rigid cell wall, which causes plant cells to typically have more distinct edges and a rectangular shape.

Enjoy your study of plant and animal cells!

Click here for more Biology activities for kids.

Related Links

Science Activities for Kids
Chemistry Activities for Kids
Robotics Activities for Kids

The post Plant and Animal Cell Comparison Activity appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

My 8 year old and I both got pretty confused when we were studying plant cells. With animals, whether or not something is alive or dead is pretty well defined. With plants, however, it is less clear. For example, my son asked if a potato in our pantry was alive or dead. What about potato chips? The inspiration for his difficult questions were this episode of Bill Nye the Science Guy.

I actually didn’t know. I’m still not 100% sure. A plant that is growing in the ground is definitely alive and has living cells. I’m also pretty darn positive that potato chips are not alive and do not have living cells. I *think* a potato in my pantry actually is still alive in some way. They occasionally sprout if I leave them too long. If I planted them in the ground, they would grow. So my best guess, is yes, potatoes in the pantry are alive or at least have some living cells.

Then he started asking me even more confusing questions like, what happens to dead cells? Do they disappear or do all the organelles just stay there, but stop doing things? My response, “Great questions, buddy. I have no idea.” Maybe one day I’ll understand the intricacies of cell biology. Maybe he’ll go to college and study biology. For now, I’m just glad my kids are asking questions. Curiosity is the most important part of learning, in my opinion.

As I mentioned in my animal cell post, you do not need to use the same food items that I used in my cell. I wanted my model to look more or less like the picture of a cell in my high school level biology book, but if you need to switch something out for something else, your kids really aren’t losing much. For your reference, this is what I used:

• cytosol – gelatin
• nucleus – tangerine
• nuclear envelope – tangerine peel
• nucleolus – blueberry
• chloroplasts – green grapes
• Golgi apparatus – folded lasagna noodles
• ribosomes – pearl couscous
• smooth endoplasmic reticulum – manicotti glued together
• rough endoplasmic reticulum – manicotti glued together with pearl couscous
• lysosomes – peas
• mitochondria – red beans
• vacuole – water balloons
• cytoskeleton – spaghetti and angel hair pasta
• cell membrane – plastic wrap
• cell wall – square baking dish

If you decide to follow the detailed, step-by-step directions in the tutorial below, you can use this list as an answer key to go along with these free, printable plant cell toothpick labels. Kids can either use these labels to test their own memory or they can play a multiplayer game.

Since I have 4 kids of very different ages, we played by putting all the flags in a small container. Then the kids took turns closing their eyes and picking out a flag at random.

Then, based on whichever flag they picked (and their age), I would give them clues to know where to put the flag. “This organelle is only found in plant cells, not animal cells. It helps with photosynthesis and gives plants their green color. It’s bigger than the peas, which are the lysosomes….the grapes, right!”

Because our toddler wants to be involved in everything the big kids do, he was allowed to put the flags wherever he wanted. Our only goal was to keep him from popping the water balloon!

Recommended Age Range: Kindergarten, Elementary, Middle School
Time Required: ~2 hours (about half of this time is waiting for the gelatin to start to solidify)
Difficulty: Easy — but you do need to check frequently when the gelatin is getting firm to make sure it doesn’t completely solidify before you add your organelles
Cost: Free printable. Under $10 in used supplies. I used primarily things we already had in the pantry and fridge, but I did end up buying a small carton of blueberries and a box of gelatin. I recommend switching out items if necessary to avoid buying things if your family won’t enjoy whatever isn’t used.

Materials:

• paper for printing flag labels
• 13 toothpicks (the cell membrane and cell wall labels will just be taped or glued to the plastic wrap and glass dish)
• gelatin (I used a box of Knox gelatin from the grocery store that only came with 4 envelopes. We used all 4 envelopes.)
• one tangerine
• one blueberry
• about 10 peas (I used frozen)
• about 7 green grapes
• 3 spaghetti noodles
• 3 angel hair pasta noodles (optional, could just use more spaghetti)
• about 10 beans (I used red beans, but any kind is fine)
• 2 manicotti noodles
• one lasagna noodle sheet (I used the flat, oven-ready kind, but the bumpy kind should work too)
• handful of pearl couscous
• 1 water balloon
• plastic wrap
• one drop of food coloring (I used green, but the cytosol doesn’t really have a color, so it doesn’t matter)

Supplies:

• square (or rectangular) baking dish that will hold at least 6 cups of liquid. I used a 9″ x 9″ dish. (You will only be adding 4 cups of liquid, but you also need room to add all the “organelles.”)
• measuring glass
• pot for heating water
• spoon
• glue (I used Elmer’s, but other types would likely work)

Instructions:

1. First, cook the 2 manicotti noodles and the lasagna noodle so they are soft by boiling them in water for a few minutes.
2. Use glue to fold and secure the lasagna noodle as shown. Wait a couple minutes for the glue to dry.




3. Cut the folded lasagna noodle in half.



4. Apply glue to the larger flat sides of each half.



5. Glue the two halves together. You now have a Golgi apparatus (which are also sometimes called Golgi bodies.)
   
6. Measure 3 cups of water.



7. Start boiling the 3 cups of water. You can continue assembling other “organelles” while you wait for the water to boil.



8. Cut a cooked manicotti noodle into 3 pieces.



9. Apply glue to the inside of all 3 manicotti noodle pieces and the top of two.



10. Stack the manicotti noodles together as shown.



11. Place something heavy on top of the manicotti pieces and wait for it to dry. This is your smooth endoplasmic reticulum.



12. Now we are going to repeat the previous 4 steps again, but this time, add pearl couscous. Start by cutting your second manicotti into 3 pieces.



13. Apply glue to the manicotti pieces as before, but this time stick some pearl couscous on the insides and outsides.



14. Stack them together, as before, adding pearl couscous.



15. Put a toothpick threw the pieces to hold them together. Add more pearl couscous to the outer surfaces with glue.



16. Don’t forget to add pearl couscous to the bottom of the stack of manicotti pieces. You now have your rough endoplasmic reticulum.



17. By this time, your water will probably be boiling. If so, measure 1 cup of water.



18. Add 4 packets of gelatin to water (if using Knox envelopes. It not, check the packaging of your gelatin to figure out how much to add to 4 cups total of water.) Let stand for 1 minute.



19. Stir the gelatin into the water.



20. Add boiling water to the gelatin mixture.



21. Add one drop of food coloring and stir. This is your cytosol. Note that when I was in school, we called this cytoplasm. However, the convention now seems to be that the word cytoplasm includes other structures such as ribosomes (couscous).



22. Use plastic wrap to cover your dish. You will likely need to use two pieces. The square dish is your cell wall. The plastic wrap is your cell membrane.




23. Pour the green “cytosol” into the bowl with the plastic wrap. You will probably want to let this cool off a bit before sticking it in the fridge.



24. While you wait for it to cool off, fill up a water balloon. This will be your vacuole. If you are going to make an animal cell to compare with your plant cell, make sure to fill this plant cell water balloon more than you did for the animal cell. A plant cell usually only contains one larger vacuole instead of a few smaller ones like an animal cell.




25. Cut a tangerine in half.



26. Place a blueberry into the center of the tangerine. The entire tangerine plus blueberry is the nucleus of the cell. The blueberry is the nucleolus and the tangerine peel is the nuclear envelope.



27. Break up some pieces of spaghetti and angel hair pasta into 2 or 3 pieces. This will be your cytoskeleton.



28. If you feel like the level of your “cytosol” is too low. Feel free to add a little more water. I ended up adding another cup of water.



29. Check if your bowl with gelatin mixture is no longer hot. If so, place it in the refrigerator.



30. CHECK THE CLOCK! You will want to pull the gelatin out of the fridge BEFORE it solidifies. You want it to have started getting thicker, so that your organelles will not sink all the way to the bottom, but you also don’t want it to be so solid that you have to break the gelatin to insert your organelles. For me, the ideal time was between 45 and 55 minutes. Around the 30 minute mark, I would start checking every 5 minutes or so. (Note: even if you feel you’ve waited a little too long, I found that having it sit out on the counter for a few minutes while I inserted my food items was long enough for the cracks in the surface to “heal” themselves.
31. While you are waiting for your gelatin to gel, make your toothpick flags. First cut out all the plant cell labels.




32. Set the cell membrane and cell wall labels off to the side. Since you will want to attach these to the plastic wrap and glass dish, you do not need the toothpick. You can either use glue or tape.
33. Apply glue to the back of a label.



34. Fold the two sides together and stick a toothpick in the opening.



35. Secure the label around the toothpick and let it dry.



36. Repeat for the other 12 labels (being sure to exclude the cell membrane and cell wall labels).
37. Once your gelatin has just barely started to gel, pull it out of the fridge. Note that the order of the next several steps is not important.
38. Add your water balloon to your cell. This represents a vacuole.



39. Add your half tangerine with a blueberry in the middle to your cell. This represents the nucleus including both the nuclear envelope (the peel) and the nucleolus (the blueberry).



40. Add the manicotti with attached couscous to the cell near the nucleus. This represents the rough endoplasmic reticulum.



41. Add the manicotti without the couscous farther away from the nucleus. This is the smooth endoplasmic reticulum.



42. Add your folded lasagna noodle to the cell. This is your Golgi apparatus.



43. Add some green grapes to your cell. These will represent chloroplasts.



44. Add beans to you cell to represent mitochondria.



45. Add couscous to your cell. These will be your ribosomes.



46. Add peas to your plant cell. These represent lysosomes.



47. Add spaghetti and angel hair to the cell to represent cytoskeleton.



48. Place back in the fridge for another 30 minutes or so in order for the gelatin to completely solidify.

You now have a completed plant cell model! Now as you learn about each organelle, you can use your flags to label each part of the cell.

Kids can use the flags to test their own knowledge or take turns placing the flags to play a multi-player game.

I hope your kids enjoy this activity demonstrating plant cell biology!

Click here for more Biology activities for kids.

Related Links

Science Activities for Kids
Chemistry Activities for Kids
Robotics Activities for Kids

The post Plant Cell Model appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

The first time I made a cell model using food items was over 20 years ago. (Time flies, doesn’t it?!) It was high school Honors Biology and for that rendition of this classic science demonstration, I pretty much used only candy. If it didn’t have a high sugar content, it didn’t go in my model. Jello, Red Hots, gummy worms….I’m pretty sure my primary motivation was eating the leftovers. “I’m not kidding, Mom! I really do need a giant box of jellybeans for school!”

I remember the only problem being that a lot of the dyes in the candy bled into my cytoplasm. This time around, I decided to opt for a more color-stable, healthy assortment of food products. That way if my kids decided to sample the nucleus, they wouldn’t be bouncing off the walls for hours.

Below I will provide a step-by-step, picture tutorial for how I put together our animal cell model. However, there’s no need to use the exact same items that I used. I chose items based roughly on how I thought each organelle (cell component) should look, but let’s be honest…food is never going to exactly replicate the microscopic building blocks of life. If you need to switch out your pearl couscous for rice or your peas for corn…don’t worry about it! Work with what you have.

Here is an outline of what I used for your reference:

• cytosol – gelatin
• nucleus – tangerine
• nuclear envelope – tangerine peel
• nucleolus – blueberry
• Golgi apparatus – folded lasagna noodles
• ribosomes – pearl couscous
• smooth endoplasmic reticulum – manicotti glued together
• rough endoplasmic reticulum – manicotti glued together with pearl couscous
• lisosomes – peas
• mitochondria – red beans
• vacuole – water balloons
• centriole – spaghetti glued together
• cytoskeleton – spaghetti and angel hair pasta
• cell membrane – plastic wrap

Once you’ve assembled your animal cell, feel free to use my free printable labels to make toothpick flags and let your child or student practice putting the flags into the cell. In doing this they can test their own knowledge by checking back with the list above. If you have more than one child (as I do), you can also have them take turns picking a flag at random.

You can turn it into a game by having them score points if they are able to poke the flag into an appropriate spot. However, since my kids vary greatly in age and ability, I just gave them clues to figure out where to put it. “Mitochondria….remember, that’s the powerhouse of the cell. They are pretty small…not round like a ball, but a little stretched out…maybe a little bean-shaped even.” Basically I would just keep talking until I told them exactly where it should go if necessary.

If you are looking for ways to help introduce your child to cells, unfortunately I have not found any books that I’ve been overly impressed with. When I was making my model, I referred to a high school level biology text book I happen to own, but that is definitely not appropriate for my elementary-aged kids. Instead, we watched this FreeSchool video about cells and, going back to my own school days, this episode of Bill Nye the Science Guy. If you know of any great cell resources for kids, please comment below to let me know!

Recommended Age Range: Kindergarten, Elementary, Middle School
Time Required: ~2 hours (about half of this time is waiting for the gelatin to start to solidify)
Difficulty: Easy — but you do need to check frequently when the gelatin is getting firm to make sure it doesn’t completely solidify before you add your organelles
Cost: Free printable. Under $10 in used supplies. I used primarily things we already had in the pantry and fridge, but I did end up buying a small carton of blueberries and a box of gelatin. I recommend switching out items if necessary to avoid buying things if your family won’t enjoy whatever isn’t used.

Materials:

• paper for printing flag labels
• 13 toothpicks (the cell membrane label will just be taped or glued to the plastic wrap)
• gelatin (I used a box of Knox gelatin from the grocery store that only came with 4 envelopes. We used all 4 envelopes.)
• one tangerine
• one blueberry
• about 10 peas (I used frozen)
• 5 spaghetti noodles (2 will be used for centrioles and the rest for the cytoskeleton)
• 3 angel hair pasta noodles (optional, could just use more spaghetti)
• about 10 beans (I used red beans, but any kind is fine)
• 2 manicotti noodles
• one lasagna noodle sheet (I used the flat, oven-ready kind, but the bumpy kind should work too)
• handful of pearl couscous
• 2 or 3 water balloons
• plastic wrap
• one drop of food coloring (I used blue, but the cytosol doesn’t really have a color, so it doesn’t matter)

Supplies:

• round glass bowl that will hold at least 6 cups of liquid. (You will only be adding 4 cups of liquid, but you also need room to add all the “organelles.”)
• measuring glass
• pot for heating water
• spoon
• glue (I used Elmer’s, but other types would likely work)

Instructions:

1. First, cook the 2 manicotti noodles and the lasagna noodle so they are soft by boiling them in water for a few minutes.
2. Use glue to fold and secure the lasagna noodle as shown. Wait a couple minutes for the glue to dry.




3. Cut the folded lasagna noodle in half.



4. Apply glue to the larger flat sides of each half.



5. Glue the two halves together. You now have a Golgi apparatus (which are also sometimes called Golgi bodies.)
   
6. Measure 3 cups of water.



7. Start boiling the 3 cups of water. You can continue assembling other “organelles” while you wait for the water to boil.



8. Break 2 spaghetti noodles into about 1 inch pieces.



9. Apply glue to about 5 or 6 pieces side by side.



10. Spread the glue around and push the spaghetti pieces together as shown. This will be a centriole. Make 2 and let dry.



11. Cut a cooked manicotti noodle into 3 pieces.



12. Apply glue to the inside of all 3 manicotti noodle pieces and the top of two.



13. Stack the manicotti noodles together as shown.



14. Place something heavy on top of the manicotti pieces and wait for it to dry. This is your smooth endoplasmic reticulum.



15. Now we are going to repeat the previous 4 steps again, but this time, add pearl couscous. Start by cutting your second manicotti into 3 pieces.



16. Apply glue to the manicotti pieces as before, but this time stick some pearl couscous on the insides and outsides.



17. Stack them together, as before, adding pearl couscous.



18. Put a toothpick threw the pieces to hold them together. Add more pearl couscous to the outer surfaces with glue.



19. Don’t forget to add pearl couscous to the bottom of the stack of manicotti pieces. You now have your rough endoplasmic reticulum.



20. By this time, your water will probably be boiling. If so, measure 1 cup of water.



21. Add 4 packets of gelatin to water (if using Knox envelopes. It not, check the packaging of your gelatin to figure out how much to add to 4 cups total of water.) Let stand for 1 minute.



22. Stir the gelatin into the water.



23. Add boiling water to the gelatin mixture.



24. Add one drop of food coloring and stir. This is your cytosol. Note that when I was in school, we called this cytoplasm. However, the convention now seems to be that the word cytoplasm includes other structures such as ribosomes (couscous).



25. Use plastic wrap to cover your bowl. You will likely need to use two pieces. This is your cell membrane.



26. Pour the blue “cytosol” into the bowl with the plastic wrap. You will probably want to let this cool off a bit before sticking it in the fridge.



27. While you wait for it to cool off, fill up water balloons. These will be your vacuoles. If you are going to make a plant cell to compare with your animal cell, make sure to fill these water balloons for the animal cell less. The animal cell vacuoles are smaller than the one in a plant cell.




28. Cut a tangerine in half.



29. Place a blueberry into the center of the tangerine. The entire tangerine plus blueberry is the nucleus of the cell. The blueberry is the nucleolus and the tangerine peel is the nuclear envelope.



30. Break up some pieces of spaghetti and angel hair pasta into 2 or 3 pieces. This will be your cytoskeleton.



31. Check if your bowl with gelatin mixture is no longer hot. If so, place it in the refrigerator.



32. CHECK THE CLOCK! You will want to pull the gelatin out of the fridge, BEFORE it solidifies. You want it to have started getting thicker, so that your organelles will not sink all the way to the bottom, but you also don’t want it to be so solid that you have to break the gelatin to insert your organelles. For me, the ideal time was between 45 and 55 minutes. Around the 30 minute mark, I would start checking every 5 minutes or so. (Note: even if you feel you’ve waited a little too long, I found that having it sit out on the counter for a few minutes while I inserted my food items was long enough for the cracks in the surface to “heal” themselves.
33. While you are waiting for your gelatin to gel, make your toothpick flags. First cut out all the animal cell labels.




34. Set the cell membrane label off to the side. Since you will want to attach this one to the plastic wrap, you do not need the toothpick. You can either use glue or tape. Also, note that there is no cell wall label. Unlike plant cells, animal cells lack a cell wall. In the plant cell, I called the bowl the cell wall. The animal cell still contains a bowl, but this bowl is there simply to support the shape of our cell, not to act as a cell wall.
35. Apply glue to the back of a label.



36. Fold the two sides together and stick a toothpick in the opening.



37. Secure the label around the toothpick and let it dry.



38. Repeat for the other 12 labels (being sure to exclude the cell membrane label).
39. Once your gelatin has just barely started to gel, pull it out of the fridge. Note that the order of the next several steps is not important.
40. Add peas to the cell. These are the lysosomes.



42. Add 2 to 3 water balloons to cell. These are the vacuoles.



43. Add the tangerine with a blueberry in the middle to the cell. This is your nucleus, nucleolus, and nuclear envelope.



44. Add the manicotti with pearl couscous attached to it near the nucleus. This is your rough endoplasmic reticulum.



45. Add the manicotti without pearl couscous farther away from the nucleus. This is your smooth endoplasmic reticulum.



46. Add folded lasagna to the cell. This is the Golgi apparatus.



47. Add 1 inch spaghetti noodles glued into two clumps to the cell. These are your centrioles. They should be perpendicular to each other.



48. Add beans to cell model. These are the mitochondria.



49. Add pearl couscous to cell model. These represent ribosomes.



50. Add spaghetti and angel hair pasta to cell. This represents your cytoskeleton.



51. Place back in the fridge for another 30 minutes or so in order for the gelatin to completely solidify.

You now have a completed animal cell model! Now as you learn about each organelle, you can use your flags to label each part of the cell.

Kids can use the flags to test their own knowledge or take turns placing the flags to play a multi-player game.

I hope your kids enjoy this activity demonstrating animal cell biology!

Click here for more Biology activities for kids.

Related Links

Science Activities for Kids
Chemistry Activities for Kids
Robotics Activities for Kids

The post Animal Cell Model appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

We probably never would have done this experiment if it weren’t for this really cool crime-solving kit my 8 year old got for Christmas. In it, we had to extract DNA from a piece of fruit in order to catch the treasure thief. There was no way around it. To solve the crime, we had to do the experiment. I couldn’t skip over this activity like I normally do when I see it in science books.

Now, to be honest, I don’t think my kids were as blown away by the simple elegance and biological beauty of the activity as I was. They were like, “oh, that’s so cool!” then went back to shooting each other with their new nerf guns. I, however, could not get over the fact that I was holding in my hands clumped together strands of genetic material.

As I stood admiring the gelatinous goo, my 5 year old daughter said, “What would happen if you shook it?” I said, “I don’t know, honey,” and gently swirled the test tube. She took it from me and said, “No, not like that…like this,” and violently shook the tube up and down. At least my girl isn’t afraid of science. It turns out, the DNA was still clearly visible and just as cool.

Please note that there are a great many ways to perform this experiment. For example, many instructions involve a blender. Some don’t involve the straining step. The instructions below are loosely based on the crime-solving, spy kit that my son received. I liked this version since I found the process to be simple and the results to be impressive. If you’re interested in more of the science behind the experiment, I recommend this article by Scientific American.

Recommended Age Range: Elementary, Middle School, High School
Time Required: ~10-15 minutes (though rubbing alcohol should be put in the freezer 30+ minutes before the experiment)
Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Less than $5. We had everything on hand. However, if you don’t have rubbing alcohol, dish soap, or salt, you may need to purchase those items. Although it is not necessary, to have DNA float on its own, you may want to spend under $10 on a round-bottomed test tube.

Materials:

• 2 teaspoons water (not pictured)
• 1/4 teaspoon dish soap
• pinch of salt
• about 1 cup of rubbing alcohol (or much less if using a test tube instead of a glass cup)
• strawberry
• Ziploc bag
• paper towel (could also use cheesecloth or even a wire mesh)
• skewer (Optional, not pictured. Used to pick up the DNA. Could also use a toothpick, fork, or sharpened pencil.)

Supplies:

• container such as a glass cup (alternatively, you can use a round-bottomed test tube similar to the one that came with our crime kit.)
• rubber band
• measuring spoons (specifically teaspoon and 1/4 teaspoon)

Instructions:

1. Put rubbing alcohol in the freezer. It’s recommended that you leave it in the freezer for at least 30 minutes, but it won’t freeze in the freezer, so you could put it in as long as you like in advance. Also, during one of our trials, we forgot and left the alcohol on the counter for about 20 minutes before adding it to our solution and it still worked fine, so I don’t think the amount of time is critical. The activity just works a little better if the rubbing alcohol is cold.

2. Put the strawberry in the Ziploc bag and seal it.

3. Mash it up. My kids got a little over-enthusiastic and made a big mess the first time, so maybe remind them to mash and squish it near the bottom of the bag.

4. Add 2 teaspoons of water to the glass.

5. Add 1/4 teaspoon dish soap to the water in the glass. The dish soap helps to open up the strawberry cells releasing the DNA.

6. Add a pinch of salt. This helps the strands of DNA to clump together, making them visible to the naked eye. Note that I just put a little salt in our quarter teaspoon as shown.

7. Stir the mixture. This is your extraction solution.

8. Add the extraction solution to the mashed strawberry.

9. Squish the bag to mix the extraction solution into the strawberry. Again, remind kids to keep the mixture towards the bottom of the bag away from the seal. This should take a couple minutes.

10. Use a rubberband to secure a paper towel to the top of the glass.

11. Push down in the middle of the paper towel gently to create a well to hold the strawberry mixture.

12. Pour the strawberry mixture onto the paper towel.

13. Now, wait patiently to collect some droplets of the mixture. We waited about 3 minutes.

14. After a few minutes, take off the paper towel and strawberry mixture. You should have some drops in your glass. It’s okay to have only a few drops. There will still be DNA.

15. Remove the rubbing alcohol from the freezer and add it to your solution. You don’t need to add a lot, but I added about a cup.

15. Observe if any DNA starts moving into the alcohol on its own. We saw a few strands start to rise up.

16. Take a skewer or other pointy tool like a toothpick or pencil and pick up your DNA!

17. Have fun swirling your DNA and watching it move through the liquid.

When we had done the experiment in the test tube, the DNA actually floated all the way to the surface. I think this has something to do with the round bottom allowing the DNA to clump together better and be carried to the surface by air bubbles.

However, what we observed in our drinking glass on the skewer was still definitely the same gooey strands.

Have fun exploring genetic material with your budding biologists!

Click here for more Biology activities and printables for kids.

Related Links

Easy Robotics Projects for Kids
Science Activities for Kids
Learning Activities for Kids

The post Extracting DNA from a Strawberry appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

Product: Sassafras Science Adventures living book series
Company: Elemental Science
Recommended Age Range: Kindergarten, Elementary
Time Required: about 60 to 90 minutes per week
Difficulty: Program is easy to follow and story is fairly easy to understand even for early elementary. The science described can be fairly advanced, but full understanding is not necessary in order to use the curriculum.
Cost: $25 to $100 per volume depending on how much supplemental material you want. (Each volume lasts one semester and there are 4 volumes so far.)

Bottomline

In my opinion, all you really need to get nearly everything out of this program is the living book (the Kindle version is $10) and the lapbook for $15. I also highly recommend the audiobook if you spend a good amount of time in the car. This material lasts for 18 weeks or about a semester. Given that my son loves listening to the story, is being exposed to really complex science, and has produced quality interactive notebooks using the lapbook material over the course of the year, I feel like this science curriculum is hard to beat.

How We Use It

Over the past year, my son (a first grader) and I have worked our way through the first two volumes of Sassafras Science: Zoology and Anatomy. He has simultaneously used the lapbook materials to make a book for each of the two volumes. Usually, he colors the pictures for the lapbook material while I read-aloud from my Kindle or we listen to the audiobook. After he finishes listening to a section, we go back to the relevant parts of the book and I re-read the scientific parts, so he can pick what he found the most interesting. He tells me what he wants to write in his lapbook, I write the sentence on a piece of scratch paper, and he copies it into the appropriate part of his lapbook.

Instead of making actual lapbooks out of these pieces using file folders as suggested, I’ve chosen to use these lapbooking pieces in interactive notebooks. For each volume, I simply bind together 9 pieces of cardstock, then glue the pieces into the homemade notebook instead. (Have I mentioned that I love my binding machine? A detailed review and description of the many things I use it for can be found here.)

I’ll admit, very few of the curricula choices I made last summer have completely panned out. However, Sassafras is one of the few that we’ve really stuck with throughout the whole school year. If I pull him away from playing, he’s not always super excited to start his science, but he really does enjoy the story. Once he’s been drawn into the story, he’ll yell at his younger siblings to be quiet so he can hear. He doesn’t want to miss any parts.

How Long Does it Take?

If you do one chapter a week, the program lasts 18 weeks, which allows you to finish two volumes a year. Each chapter takes about 30 to 45 minutes to read (or listen to the audiobook). All the chapters are divided into two parts, so ideally we read half a chapter twice a week. I am glad that I bought the audiobook, because if we start falling behind, we’ll listen to that week’s chapter in the car on the way to and from activities. On a good week, we spend about 45 minutes on supplemental science activities in addition to just listening to the living book. (On a bad week, we’ll only spend about 15 to make sure my son’s lapbook is complete for the week.)

After we listen to a chapter, sometimes we’ll read about the same subjects in other books. The lapbooking guide provides booklists for each chapter, which I’m sure are great, but I’ve rarely used them. I’ve REALLY liked Picturepedia for providing great visuals of both zoology and anatomy. I’m sure it will come in handy with future volumes as well. For anatomy, we’ve also been using See Inside Your Body which my kids really like.

In addition to the lapbook material, the lapbook guide also includes ideas for a number of hands-on experiments or demonstrations. I don’t always make time for these, but they’re usually pretty easy to put together and my kids LOVE them. They were big fans of the gooeyness of the giraffe saliva experiment. Recently we did the kidney demonstration and I will never forget the way my 5-year-old daughter’s eyes lit up with glee when she realized the yellow liquid we collected at the end was supposed to represent urine.

What about Kids of Multiple Ages?

One of the things that I adore most about this program is the way it serves such a wide audience. I’ll be honest…I don’t think my preschooler fully follows the story, even when we’re in the car and she has no other distractions. However, she definitely has a vague idea what’s going on and doesn’t complain listening to it. (My 2 year old, I am certain, has no clue what is going on.) My 7 year old loves these books. There is not a lot of character development or intricate plot twists, but there IS a lot of action-packed adventure which holds his interest. As an adult, they might not be my first choice of reading material, but I enjoy them too and have learned some science as well.

I feel like the science in the zoology book was right at my first grader’s level. It taught about different kinds of habitats, defense mechanisms, diets, and other aspects of zoology. I think he really was able to fully grasp maybe 90% of the science. The science in the anatomy book is at a much higher level. The story itself is just as entertaining, but whenever the “local expert” starts spouting off facts related to anatomy, even I get lost sometimes. However, that doesn’t really bother me. Maybe my son’s only retaining 20% of the science content, but since he’s not starting a pre-med program anytime soon, I don’t mind what goes over his head.

So far, we’ve only used the lapbook material, which I think is perfect for my 1st grader who is a new writer. However, they also have coloring pages, which would be appropriate for an even younger student (my preschooler colors them sometimes) and notebooking pages which would be appropriate for an older student. I could see myself repeating this curriculum in 5 years or so when my baby and toddler are older and having my oldest filling out the notebooking pages as an upper elementary student.

I should point out that while I don’t use the “Scidat Logbook” (the notebooking pages) or the teacher’s guides, I did buy them and I’m glad I own them. If my son and I are really lost about filling out a certain portion of the lapbook, the teachers guide has more info than the lapbooking guide that I can use for reference (though most of it is way too advanced for my 1st grader). As I said, I do plan to cycle through using these again someday, and I like the variety of options they have for documenting your learning experience with learners of different ages.

Do I Need to Do These In Order?

While we’re doing them in order, I don’t really think you need to. Like I said, there’s not really a lot of character development. The main premise is that two 12 year old twins are bad at science, so their crazy scientist uncle sends them off around the world on magical ziplines to learn about science from various local experts.

Not only do you not need to read the books in order, but even the topics within each book are fairly self-contained. They spend two chapters at each location learning about something specific (like the rainforest or circulatory system). At each location they have a different adventure that is usually completely unrelated to their adventures in previous locations. (There is an overarching, not-that-scary, man-with-no-eyebrows, “bad guy” that’s following them, but he only intermittently shows up and I have a feeling he’s not going to be resolved until the very last book in the series anyway, which hasn’t been written yet.)

Why Are They Called Living Books?

If you talk to a follower of the Charlotte Mason method of homeschooling, living books are really the only types of books kids should be using to learn. Personally, while I don’t follow it completely, I really like the Charlotte Mason philosophy and it was my search for living books that led me to this curriculum. What is a living book? Unlike a text book, which is a dry chronicle of facts, a living book is a book written by someone with a passion for a subject that makes the subject matter “come alive.” They frequently chronicle the lives of real people or characters and involve the reader’s emotions. They are both memorable and enjoyable.

To summarize, here are some pros and cons I’ve found over the past year of using Sassafras Science Adventures:

Pros

• Easy-to-use
• Enjoyable for student (and parent)
• Provides lots of scientific information
• Great for families with kids of multiple ages
• Inexpensive
• Lots of hands-on suggestions
• Audiobook is great for learning on-the-go
• Results in attractive documentation of the child’s learning

Cons

• Science described can be a little complicated.
• If you fall behind (which we have a couple times), it can seem overwhelming to a young child to catch up.
• Most of the scientific information is not integral to the story, so theoretically a child reading the stories independently could skip over it.
• A lot of the time spent on this curriculum is spent listening to a fun, adventure story which does not completely pertain to science. (I don’t mind this.)
• There are aspects of the story that are not at all scientific, like the invisible ziplines. This doesn’t bother me as it makes the stories more entertaining, but be aware.
• The adventures are pretty far-fetched, especially the dangerous situations that the kids are allowed to be in, but my kids love it.

Overall, I don’t have a lot of complaints…The Sassafras twins have made science easy this past year and we’ll definitely continue to use them next year.

Here are all the volumes they have so far!

Volume 1: Zoology
Volume 2: Anatomy
Volume 3: Botany
Volume 4: Earth Science

Related Links

Biology for Kids
Learning Activities for Kids
Play Activities for Kids

The post Sassafras Science Adventures Review appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

Recently I was reading the book Fly Guy Presents: Dinosaurs with my 1st grader. He’s a big fan of the Fly Guy easy reader series, but we were unfamiliar with the “Fly Guy Presents” non-fiction series. We’ll definitely be checking out more. The dinosaur book was perfect for his level of understanding and the inspiration for these Montessori-inspired multi-part cards.

The 12 paleontology cards in this set are almost entirely from this book. The only one I added was “ammonite” since my son has an ammonite fossil. To use them, your child can match the split cards for an independent study activity or kids can get into groups for a memory style matching game. The control cards contain all the information in one place and can be used to check that their pairs are correct.

Recommended Age Range: Kindergarten, Elementary
Time Required: ~30 minutes
Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Free printable, less than $2 to laminate

Materials:

• Paper for printing Paleontology Cards and corresponding control cards. (Note that the last page of each document does not need to be printed as it just contains legal information regarding sharing and image sources.)
• 12 thermal laminating pouches

Supplies & Tools:

• Laminator
• Paper trimmer or scissors

Instructions:

1. Print the Paleontology Cards and the corresponding control cards.
2. Laminate them using thermal laminating pouches (optional, could also print on card stock, use contact paper to laminate, or not laminate them at all).
3. Cut them out.

Enjoy watching your kids become amateur paleontologists!

Click here for more Paleontology activities for kids.

Related Links

History Activities for Kids
Social Science Activities for Kids
Learning Activities for Kids

The post Paleontology Cards appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

The idea for this bug house was inspired by The Magic School Bus – Explore the Wonders of Nature kit that we recently bought (affiliate link, not sponsored, but highly recommended). The kit provided the mesh that we used to make these houses out of recycled containers, though mesh could also be purchased separately for not much cost. Given how inexpensive the kit is as a whole and how many fun activities are included, I think it’s a great value, so much so that I just signed up for their monthly science kit (affiliate link, on sale now for $9/month with coupon code MSB10, regularly $20/month).

My primary motivation for making these homemade bug houses was to give my kids another reason to ask to be outside. I really want my kids to grow up to be nature lovers. Maybe it’s naïve of me to think that I can counteract the lure of modern technology, but I would love for my kids to choose to spend time outdoors rather than in front of electronic devices when they’re older, at least some of the time. In pursuit of this goal, we try to have outdoor picnics, journal in our “nature notebooks”, and go on short walks once or twice a week. If it will encourage my kids to experience nature to the fullest, I will even violate a life long rule of mine and willingly come within 10 feet of an insect. (However, I still draw the line at bringing bugs into the house. We’re exclusively a catch-and-release family.)

Recommended Age Range: Preschool, Kindergarten, Elementary
Time Required: ~20 minutes
Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Less than $2 in used supplies

Materials:

• An empty container with a lid
• Small piece of mesh for covering windows
• Decorating supplies like paper, markers, stickers, etc. (totally optional, your bug isn’t going to know the difference)

Supplies & Tools:

• X-acto knife
• Glue stick
• Packing tape
• Scissors or paper cutter (optional, for cutting decorative paper to size)
• Ruler (optional, for measuring paper before cutting)

Instructions:

1. Cut windows in the container using the X-acto knife.



2. Decorate paper using markers, stickers, or other craft supplies and cut it to size.



3. Attach decorative paper to container. You may need to use more than one piece depending on the size of your container.



4. Cut “X”s in all the windows with the X-acto knife.



5. Fold flaps in and glue onto the inside of the container.



6. Cut a piece of mesh slightly bigger than each window.



7. Tape the mesh onto the inside surface of the container around each edge.


Now your containers are ready for a bug hunt!


8. Before placing your captured bugs inside, first put some dirt, grass, leaves, sticks, and other bits of nature into the container to make your guest feel more at home.


Now you’re ready to catch some bugs.

Related Links

Homemade Fun for Kids
Best Books for Kids
Best Gifts for Kids

The post Homemade Bug Houses appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

I really enjoy making 3-part cards, because I usually learn a lot in the process of making them. (You’ll find many other sets in the free printables section of this website.) I really wanted my son to get a sense of how big these dinosaurs actually were, so I included a little man on each card for reference.

I’ve never actually made a lap book before. Since I started homeschooling my son a month ago, I’ve come across this concept in a number of places and they look like so much fun. I had no idea that this lap book would end up being so educational as well. Not only did my son learn some facts about dinosaurs, but he also got practice writing and learned a little geography, science, history, and math.

On one of the internal pages, he wrote about his favorite dinosaur, “stegosoris.” He also glued each of the 12 dinosaurs in the set onto the continent where their bones have been found. We choose the 12 dinosaurs to feature in this set together based on his favorites, so I had no idea they would be so North America heavy. However, my son is happy, because now he thinks he might find all these dinosaur bones in our backyard. On the side flaps, we did a little extra science by learning the scientific names for plant-eaters and meat-eaters.

Another activity involved sorting the dinosaurs into their respective time periods. He thought this was interesting, because he had assumed Stegosaurus and T-rex fought each other, but now he understands that didn’t actually happen since they lived at different times. The battles between T-rex and Triceratops, however, are free to rage on in his imagination. (As a side note, if you disagree with the dates in this activity based on your religious beliefs, please see the end of this post for an alternative version of the printable.)

The last activity involved sorting the dinosaurs from smallest to biggest, which took some critical thinking. He needed to consider the perspective of the little reference man in each image to figure out how big the dinosaurs really were. I was surprised that he was able to do this almost entirely on his own. I consider this to be a math activity as it involves mathematical thinking to complete. The other sorting activities (herbivore/carnivore, time periods, and world map) also provided valuable opportunities for him to practice organizing information in different ways, a skill that is important in the study of science.

To complete these cards, I used Wikipedia and the National Geographic Kids book called The Ultimate Dino-pedia (Amazon affiliate link). I recommend checking it out from your local library if available.

Recommended Age Range: Preschool, Kindergarten, Elementary
Time Required: 30 minutes to laminate 3-part cards, 30 minutes to get lap book ready for child, about 1-2 hours for child to complete lap book
Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Free printable. Less than $2 in used supplies (even less if you use contact paper instead of laminating pouches to laminate).

Dinosaur Card Supplies:

Dinosaurs Lap Book Supplies:

Materials:

• paper (for printing Dinosaur Cards, the corresponding control cards, and the Dinosaurs Lap Book)
• 6 laminating pouches
• 1 file folder
• 2 pieces of cardstock

Supplies & Tools:

• laminator (affiliate link)
• scissors
• glue stick
• packing tape
• paper cutter (optional)

Instructions:

1. First, print the Dinosaur Cards, the corresponding control cards, and the Dinosaurs Lap Book).
To make the 3-part cards
2. Laminate the dinosaur cards and the control cards.
3. Cut them out.



To make the lap book
4. First open the folder up flat. Then fold the two edges into the center. I folded the shorter side exactly to the center and folded the longer side so that it overlapped by the size of the tab.



5. Next open up the flaps and tape the pieces of cardstock onto the top and bottom of the middle sections. Make sure to that when you apply the tape to the back side, the cardstock is already folded in, as shown.


This is what it should look like when they are attached.


6. Place the cover where you would like it to sit on the front of the lap book. Then lift up the top flap and place it on top of the cover without moving the cover. Trace the line along the top flap as shown.



7. Cut along the line and glue the two pieces onto the cover. I didn’t do this, but you might want to have your child write the name and date before you cut and glue the cover onto the file folder.



8. Next, cut the carnivore/herbivore activity in half and glue one half to each of the two inner side flaps. Cut out the dinosaur pieces to go with this activity.



9. Glue the favorite dinosaur and map activity page onto one of the two pieces of cardstock. You may want to have the child write first before you glue since it might be a little easier to write on a hard surface. Cut out the dinosaur pieces to go with the map activity.
10. Glue the time period activity onto the other piece of card and cut out the dinosaur pieces for this activity.



11. Lastly, glue the “Smallest to Biggest” label on the very top of the opened piece of cardstock and cut out the information cards to go with this activity. I chose to leave the descriptions and pictures attached and let my son cut them in half once he decided where they should go. See the pictures above for how the completed project should look.

You should have all the pieces cut out and ready to be glued on at this point. (You could also have your child do the cutting, but I knew mine would get super frustrated if I made him do this much work before the work actually started.)

Note that you don’t have to cut around each dinosaur for the map, time period, and herbivore/carnivore activity, but the squares will need to overlap slightly if you don’t. I think it’s more fun if you cut around each dinosaur to make them look more like stickers.

To do the activities in this lap book, I had my kindergartner use the laminated control cards for reference. You can do the activities in any order, but to start, he took all 12 control cards and sorted them by dinosaur size. Once he was done, I showed him how to use the lengths printed on the cards to switch a couple of them, but honestly, a couple of the orderings are a little arbitrary since some of the dinosaurs are slightly taller than longer dinosaurs.

I then helped him glue the dinosaurs onto the inner 3 page length section.

For each of the 3 remaining gluing activities, my son again used the laminated control cards. He’s not reading yet, but I showed him how to recognize the words “carnivore” and “herbivore” and he sorted them into two piles, before gluing the cut out dinosaurs onto the appropriate sides. I also showed him how to recognize “Jurassic” vs. “Cretaceous” so he could sort them by time period and how to read “North America” when he was sorting them into continents. When he found the 3 that were not from North America, I read them for him and helped him find where they went on the map. (In the future, I’d like to do another set, where I specifically look for dinosaurs from other continents.)

Overall, I think this lap book was a success and I plan on making more lap book templates in the future. My son loves the finished product and couldn’t wait to show his dad when he got home. After all the exposure to these 12 dinosaurs through the various activities, he now recognizes and can name almost all 12 by sight. It’s pretty awesome to hear my 5 year old confidently saying things like “The Pachycephalosaurus is an herbivore.” If you’re interested in future lap books, please consider signing up for my newsletter to be notified when they are available. (You’ll also receive access to a page of subscriber freebies.)

Lastly, as I’ve started my homeschooling journey, I’ve recently come to learn that many of the homeschooling people in my community disagree with the dates that science has come up with to answer questions like, “When did dinosaurs live?” I honestly had no idea that an old Earth/young Earth debate even existed. While personally, I believe that the dates scientists have found are accurate, I want to be respectful of all beliefs. Therefore, I created another version of the lap book that does not specifically mention any dates. It does however still use terms like Jurassic Period and Cretaceous Period. If this goes against your religious beliefs, then I would suggest replacing this page with an activity such as: “Draw and color a backdrop and glue the cut out dinosaurs into your scene. (Volcanoes recommended!)”

Click here for more Paleontology activities for kids.

Related Links

Science Activities for Kids
Best Books for Kids
Best Gifts for Kids

The post Dinosaur Cards and Lap Book appeared first on ResearchParent.com.

The main reason I made these cards, however, was to help my kids learn geography. A few weeks ago, we made a Homemade Learning World Map with repositionable continent labels. Now that my kindergartener knows his continents, these cards can be used to reinforce that knowledge since this free printable features four animals from each continent, each one selected because it is predominantly found only in that one continent. One way to use this printable would be to select 7 animals (one of the four from each continent) and have your child tape them to a laminated world map.

Children who are capable of reading (or are learning to read) can use these cards Montessori-style by simply matching the labels to the picture. (For younger kids, I would only give them a continent at a time to make the task more manageable.) Control cards are provided which show the picture and label together so that the child (or parent) can refer back to this set to find the correct pairing. To turn it into a game that you can play with your child, the split activity cards can be used as a memory style matching game. The control cards could also be used alone for sorting. Children can sort the animals by continent, type, size, or conservation status.

At the request of a reader, I now also have 3-part cards that split the information on the control cards into 1) picture, 2) name of animal, and 3) additional facts to make the activity more difficult for older children.

Recommended Age Range: Preschool, Kindergarten, Elementary, Middle School, High School
Time Required: ~1 hour
Difficulty: Easy
Cost: Less than $3 in used supplies (Bulk of the cost is for the thermal laminating pouches, which are about 20 cents per pouch. You’ll need 14 sheets if you want to make both the matching and control cards, though you could save money by not laminating them or using contact paper.)

Materials:

• paper (for printing World Zoology 2-Part Cards printable and the corresponding Control Cards. Note: For older elementary children, you may prefer to use the cards split 3 ways instead.)
• laminating pouches

Supplies & Tools:

• laminator (affiliate link)
• scissors or paper cutter (or both)

Instructions:

1. Print the World Zoology Cards and Control Cards printables. (Note: Only the first 7 pages of each document should be printed as the last 2 pages contain legal information about sharing and image sources.)
2. Laminate them.
3. Cut them out.

I recommend starting kids off with just one continent group at a time before attempting the full set.

Don’t forget, these cards can also be combined with my Homemade Learning World Map for a more hands-on activity.

If you enjoyed this printable, please consider signing up for my newsletter (which includes a freebie useful for kids in middle school or younger).

Related Links

Learning Activities for Kids
Best Books for Kids

The post World Zoology Cards appeared first on ResearchParent.com.