What’s this challenge all about?
Today’s activity will be a little different and is designed to be done throughout the weekend. It’s more of a STEM challenge than an experiment. Start today’s post by watching Andrea’s video first. Materials needed: your imagination and any household items
Because a Little Bug went Ka-choo! by Rosetta Stone– Primary (K-2)
Whatever your age, this is a cute, entertaining story filled with cause & effect. You will be amazed at what happens just because a little bug sneezed 🙂 It shows how one cause and effect pair can be turned in to a whole chain-reaction!
Want to see a few Rube Goldberg Machines in Action?
Now, while those are really entertaining and cool, they are a *bit* complicated 🙂 Let’s see a few Rube Goldberg Machines made by kids like you.
Ideas & Examples for Primary (K-2) Students
Ideas & Examples for Intermediate (3-5) Students
More about Simple Machines
In most of the examples, you hear the kids talking about simple machines. Simple machines as things that help us do more work with less effort. Rube Goldberg Machines are filled with simple machines. To help you design a Rube Goldberg Machine that works, let’s take a closer look at simple machines.
Let’s Have Fun with Simple Machines– Primary (K-2)
Simple Machines for Kids– Intermediate (3-5)
Time to start building your own Rube Goldberg Machine!
Now that you’ve watched a bunch of examples and you’ve learned about simple machines that will help your machine “work”, it’s time to begin planning your machine. Follow these simple steps to plan, design & build your machine!
- Decide on the “job” you want done. (Ex. book to fall over, dog to be fed, light switch turn on, throw a piece of trash away, etc.)
- Start thinking about the cause & effect pairs of how you will accomplish this.
- Start collecting materials.
- Start building/engineering your machine, one step at a time. Lay out your materials and what makes sense where. Remember the different kinds of simple machines, and how you can make them using your household objects. Honestly, it will seem a lot like playing as you work to fit it all together.
- Test as you build. See what parts work and which parts need to be tweaked as you build.
- When you *think* it’s ready, give it a test run. Remember, it may not totally work. You may need to go back to your design and engineer a way to fix the problem.
- Have mom or dad film your Rube Goldberg Machine in action. Starting on Saturday, we’ll have a post on our Facebook page for you to post yours. The challenge will run through Monday (3/23) night @ 5pm, so be sure to post it by then. We will pick two that we like the best: one from younger kids (primary) and one from older kids (intermediate), and we’ll send you a special prize! Click to go to our Facebook page!
Additional Resources
Click the title to access the resource.
How to make a Rube Goldberg Machine; Boys’ Life Website
Build Your Own Rube Goldberg Machine; Connections Academy
Sesame Street: Rube Goldberg Machines (YouTube video) Perfect for younger kiddos!
Thank you very much for this blog. We have done all of the projects this week and my kids have enjoyed them very much! I have a 7 and 9 year old but I am also watching my niece and nephew who are 13 and 5. It’s been our favorite part of our days at home.
So happy to hear! Let us know if there’s anything else we can do to support you at home!
we need you to show us techniques for a new Rube Goldberg machine that my sons are making
We’d be happy to give some suggestions! You can email us at sciencecamps@clubsscikidzmd.com