Karen's Clan

Benjamin Franklin is wearing bifocal glasses in this little picture. The Franklin headshot on the sheet of paper has him without glasses - so in essence, through "spot the difference" the kids figured them all out!

Then I spoke to them about electricity - what it was, Thomas Edison (a great man and awesome character study!). We talked about atoms and electrons - and here they are playing a game where they are holding cards showing a positive charge in one hand and a negative charge in the other. If they found a similar charge, they had to run away from each other, and if they found the opposite charge, they had to link arms and turn around! I shouted "Show your cards!" at various intervals - and I'm glad I demarcated the bricks as a limited space else they might have been running around the garden!


Then we looked at static electricity - rub a spoon on your head, and then see what happens when you hold it over a plate of slat and pepper! This caused such wonder, I was simply amused! They loved it. We also used small bits of paper.




After a break, we had more fun - this time with current electricity - I had found this inpsirational site about squishy circuits for kids (no need to use soldering irons :)). Did you know that if you make a play dough with sugar instead of salt it will act as an insulating dough?







They had so much fun, they took all their lights into our playroom which can become pitch black and using various Lego pieces made glow in the dark cities!


King Arthur didn't stop using his all day - in fact, he even used some sticky stuff (think here you call it prestick?) to make a one eyed alien with a friend afterwards!