Sincerely, Mrs. Monk: Little Inventors

For the last two weeks, we have been studying inventors in science. We have learned about great inventors throughout time and how everything we use has been invented by someone to make our lives a little easier. Last week, I told the students that I lost my door stop and that I needed their help. I challenged them to create something that could keep my door open. I told them that it did not have to be anything like what we used in the past - it just had to help my door stay open. The students then examined the door and came up with a plan. They worked in partner groups to invent something to help my door stay open. Once they had an idea, a name for their invention, and a plan, they looked at the materials that could help their plan come to fruition. (Thank you all for all of the extra materials from home to help with this project.) Then they set a purpose for each piece of material that they selected. Then finally after days of planning, they were able to build their invention. Today we tested out their inventions. None of the inventions quite did the job. As one student said after testing all of the inventions out, "our inventions were all a little faulty." While yes they were all a little"faulty," I reminded them that Thomas Edison tried over 1,000 times to make the electric light bulb before he got one to work just right. Of course then they all wanted to do it again. :-) Too bad we have to move on to our next unit in science otherwise, I would have some more inventions coming my way. Below is a sneak peak of what the last couple weeks have looked like.

Sincerely,
Mrs. Monk