One of the subjects that got passed over too much last fall was Science. I think that is because I want to make it so relevant and fun to learn that I procrastinate on going to the library to pick up books, to plan out interactive lessons, and so on. But this spring I’m giving science a priority! I know I could just choose a simpler science curriculum, but I really like Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding and think it will give Satori those basic building blocks of science she needs to understand the world.

Today we learned about energy, and the four types of energy – electrical, movement, light, and heat energy. Although I loved science in school, all the way up to college, before today I wouldn’t have been able to name these 4 types. I guess I learned so long ago I forgot so much. Did I mention that I love learning alongside Satori?

I whipped out these cards in a few minutes, using 3×5 index cards and markers.

Satori sat down and together we discussed all the action cards.

After we matched up all the action cards to their energy source cards, we walked around the basement and examined other objects using energy. Her solar-powered calculator uses light energy to work, as plants use light energy from the sun to grow. Stoves and ovens produce heat energy to cook our food and boil our water. We had fun demonstrating movement energy ourselves! From our read-along books, Satori already knew that electricity comes from a power plant of some sort and travels by wires to our house. So she knew how electrical plugs worked, and how appliances and other things have cords that plug into the wall to use the electrical current. Here’s an item that just sits right on our plug.

We hunted down our power box and had fun explaining how this controlled the flow of electricity to sections of the house. I shut down the power to the main basement room, and the light switch no longer worked.

There’s a handy “Notes to teacher’s” section in the chapter to explain things to the grown-ups in more technical descriptions of physics. I love reading these and Nebel’s forums to cover any complicated questions that Satori might ask, that go beyond the lessons.

Here’s an example of stored electrical energy. We found batteries in several items. Fresh batteries will release the electrical energy slowly. Once it’s depleted, the toy or flashlight won’t work.

We read our books on energy and electricity over the past month, but I do mean to get a few more from the library to go over this topic a bit more. We need to cover the storage and release of energy, and energy changes from one form to another. This weekend, we’ll wait for Daddy to experiment with a new Christmas toy that demonstrates energy, more on that this weekend!

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