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There are many benefits to incorporating robotics in your homeschool

• A fun introduction to STEM
• It’s hands-on learning
• It’s creative and encourages innovation
• Students learn problem-solving
• Students learn to persevere when things don’t work
• It equips students with tech skills they can use in future careers

But you may not know where to start. So here are some ideas based on my own experience (my one son built robots in middle and high school), and the experience of other homeschoolers I know.

Online Robotics Class

Robotics Workshops for Kids offers a free online workshop so that you can see what their classes will be like. Younger students can be accompanied by parents as they may need some help. If you love the free workshop then sign up for the class that teaches you to build Robby the Drummer robot. You will be mailed all the parts and then your child can follow along during the class to build and program it

Listen to my podcast interview with Vinod Agrawal, the owner of Robotics Workshops for Kids to learn more

Robot Kits

Some kits just have students building the robot. Some will have instructions to copy exactly and these are good for beginners as they can learn slowly.

Then it is good to progress to kits that also allow creativity as by changing things up and making their own version, students will be taking this to the next level. Many of these include the ability to program the robot.

My son had the Lego Mindstorms set. This now uses Scratch as the default programming language. Lego no longer makes Mindstorms, but the replacement is called Boost, and you can find it here.

Make a Robot from Scratch

A great way to learn more about electronics is to make a robot from scratch. Here is a simple one even elementary-age children should manage

Robotics Competitions

The most popular Robotics Competitions are hosted by FIRST. My son was on a First Lego League team in 8th and 9th grade and a few years later, I ended up coaching a middle school team for 3 years. The Lego Mindstorms robot is used for this competition. Teams consist of up to 10 students and if you ask around you are sure to find a few in your area.

Older students can participate in FIRST Robotics and FIRST Tech Challenge – also team events. Listen to this podcast episode where I talk to a student who has been competing in FIRST.

You may also find that your local community college or university hosts robotic competitions, and if you can find a Science Olympiad team to join, robotics is often one of the events.

As you can see, there are many options for adding robotics to your homeschool. Whether you include it as part of your curriculum, or add it as an “after-school” activity, it is easy to do even if you know nothing about robotics or coding.

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Teaching science as a homeschool family can be a daunting task, and with a topic as broad as anatomy, it’s difficult to know where to start. If you’re looking for some anatomy resources for your homeschool to make the topic engaging and fun for your kids, we’ve got a list for you! These are some of our favorite websites, games, and more to help you teach anatomy in a fun way. 

1. Anatomy Coloring Books 

   Memorizing and labeling parts of the body can be tedious, but coloring books make it fun and add a visual component to aid kids’ in their memory.

2. Visible Body
   

   This FREE website offers an intro to the major systems in the body. But the coolest feature is the interactive 3D models of organs that students can use to better visualize how the body functions. 

3. Models

   Models are a great way for students to view how everything in the body fits together. This one from Amazon is reasonably priced and a great, simple visual to use when doing your anatomy lessons.

4. Anatomy Zone

   The Anatomy Zone is a YouTube channel with hundreds of videos on nearly any anatomy topic you can think of. From overviews of body systems to in-depth information on specific organs, they have you covered!

5. Anatomy Fluxx

   If your children like games that can be incorporated into learning anatomy! This game teaches anatomy concepts in a fun and competitive manner. Students play different categories of cards that interact with body parts. Your students will be having fun and learning without even realizing it!

6. Puzzles

   Puzzles are a hands-on way for children to view the locations of body parts. The one linked is for the skeletal system, but you can find them for just about any system of the body! You can also find simpler ones to keep younger children interested.

7. Teach me Anatomy

   This is an app for iPhones that serves as a visual anatomy encyclopedia. Many articles and diagrams are available to explain different concepts.  It is free to download, though has extra features that can be unlocked through in-app purchases. 

8. Posters

   The more students can see something, the more likely they’ll be to remember it. These posters are a great tool to add to your school area. This way, you can easily reference the visuals as you are teaching.

9. Flash Cards

   Flash cards are perfect for students who spend a lot of time on-the-go. They allow students to easily study even when their devices aren’t available. This set on Amazon covers each system with diagrams and text, and it is organized and color-coded to allow for easy studying.

10. The Homeschool Scientist

    This page from The Homeschool Scientist offers videos, experiments, and more to help you and your students. They have information for a variety of systems, so you can easily find exactly what you need. 

11. Activity Books

    This activity book from Amazon is geared for grades 4th-7th and provides interactive learning activities. It’s a great curriculum supplement for kids who learn through visual, hands-on methods. 

12. Get Body Smart

    This website is packed with helpful information. It has articles on every body system, and they are all interactive and contain clear and detailed diagrams. It also have quizzes, which means there’s an easy way for students to test their knowledge after each article!

13. Crash Course Anatomy

    Many of you are likely already familiar with Crash Course, but my list wouldn’t be complete without them. Their videos are 10-15 minutes in length and very entertaining and enjoyable for students. It works great as a review at the end of each system!

14. Practice Quizzes

    This website has a wide variety of practice quizzes to help your student review their anatomy knowledge. These are great to use before a test!

15. FundaFunda Anatomy Unit Studies
    

    

    Of course, we encourage you to check out the anatomy unit studies we offer! We think this is one of the best anatomy resources for homeschool families The full bundle comes with 8 unit studies, each one covering a different system of the body. It has enough info for a whole year of anatomy curriculum! Or, if there’s a certain system your student is interested in, you can buy just the unit study for that system as well. These are a great deal, and they can be reused for multiple students in the family! 

The post Anatomy Resources For Your Homeschool appeared first on FundaFunda Academy.

I coach a homeschool Science Olympiad team and one of the events is Experimental Design. For the event, students use various provided materials to design and conduct an experiment on a specific topic.

For one of our practice sessions last year, I gave them different brands of paper towel and asked them to conduct an experiment on absorbency.

The result – for me – was that I changed my brand of paper towel!! Yes, the results were that dramatic.

So this activity will not only be educational and fun for your children but should also be beneficial for you!

Here is a step-by-step walkthrough of the experiment. You can use more water and more paper towels if you are using a bigger glass. Just adapt to make it work with the equipment you are using.

Hypothesis

Get your children to come up with a hypothesis as to what they expect to happen and why eg. We believe brand A will be the most absorbent, brand B then next absorbent and brand C the least absorbent because …..

Materials needed

• 3 (or more) different brands of paper towels (Note how much they cost)
• graduated cylinder (if you don’t have one use a skinny glass and measure the water you pour in and what is left using a measuring jug)
• tap water
• aluminum pie dish or a tray to prevent a mess

Procedure

1. Gather needed materials

2. Lay all paper towels on top of each other and use scissors to trim so they are all the same size (this way you’re testing how the absorbency of the towels differs and size isn’t a variable). You will need 3 pieces of each brand.

3. Take 1 paper towel from brand A and roll lengthwise so its diameter can fit in the graduated cylinder

4. Fill the graduated cylinder with lukewarm tap water to a volume of 30ml. (Note: we use metric measurements as that is standard in the scientific community).

5. Put a rolled paper towel in the cylinder so 3cm of the towel is submerged in the water

6. Hold the towel in water for 10 seconds, then lift it up out of the cylinder and allow to drip into the cylinder for 5 seconds. (The purpose for doing this was to make sure the test showed what the paper towels were absorbing AND keeping in. After all, you don’t want towels that drip out everything you’ve just cleaned up!)

7. Either dispose of paper towel in a waste bin OR place in pie pan and throw them all away at once when you finish

8. Record the volume of water remaining in the cylinder and subtract from the original 30ml to see how much water the towel absorbed

9. Repeat steps 3-8 two more times with the same brand of paper towel.

10. Now take the next brand of paper towel and do steps 3 – 9.

Data Table

Record your data as you do the experiment. Once you are finished, calculate the average amount of water left for the 3 trials of each brand of paper towel.

Graph

Draw a bar graph of the average of the tests for each brand of paper towel. It will look something like this:

The independent variable in this experiment is the brand of paper towel i.e. it is the one the tester is changing. The independent variable is always on the X-axis.

The average amount of water (over the 3 trials) left in the cylinder is the dependent variable and the bar should be drawn to this height.

Conclusion

Now that you have the data, and the graph, students can reach a conclusion. They need to decide if their hypothesis was supported by the data or not (NOTE: scientists never say their hypothesis was ‘true’ or ‘false’ but only whether the result of their experiment supported the hypothesis or not)

The Science Behind It

Paper towel is made of plant fibers. Capillary action in the fibers draws the water into the paper towels. If you have a microscope, put a piece of paper towel under it for your children to look at. The fibers are made up of tiny linked sugar molecules called cellulose. Cellulose attracts water. If you look at paper towel under a microscope you will also see that there are spaces between the fibers – and those will hold water too.

To take this one step further, take a look at how much each roll of paper towel cost and try to calculate the cost of one “test strip” for each. Relate the cost to how absorbent the brand was and that should help you select what to buy in the future.

And your children can see a practical use for science!

Don’t forget to take a look at other DIY Summer Camp ideas to do with your children.

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