Tied 2 Teaching STEM Activities, Full Year of Challenges with Close Reading Review

My family had the privilege of trying the STEM Activities, Full Year of Challenges with Close Reading from Tied 2 Teaching for this review to use in conjunction with our own curriculum at home. This is a Homeschool Review Crew Review. All opinions expressed are my own or those of my family.

Tied 2 Teaching is owned by a father of 4 children that his wife homeschools. He has been teaching in the classroom since he received his K-8 certification in 2002 from Texas Tech. He has taught Middle school Math and now currently is teaching upper elementary. Him and his wife create teaching quality materials for teachers of both home and classroom to make their lives easier and save the teacher time preparing/planning.

STEM Activities, Full Year of Challenges with Close Reading is a bundle of PDF downloads. This includes over 70 STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) design challenges from the STEM with Close Reading series. This is a full year of activities with the idea to do one activity per week. These are categorized by month of the year and are seasonal with bonus extras that you can do as well. In addition to the STEM activities directions these also have a high interest close reading passage and writing assignments included so your student has a more rounded curriculum because it integrates ELA (English Language Arts) into the learning as well. Close reading requires students to analyze, evaluate, and think critically about a given text. The STEM activities you can do with readily available materials you have around the house or the classroom. These are great for grades 3rd-6th. This comes as a compressed zip file of multiple PDFs and is about 859 MB.

STEM Design Challenges Included:

January STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• 100th Day of School STEM Challenge – Spaghetti Tower Design Challenge
• Marshmallow Snowman Challenge
• Civil Rights Monument Design Challenge
• Sled Design Challenge

February STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Valentines Day STEM Challenge – Cupid’s Bow Design
• Groundhog Day STEM Challenge – Groundhog Burrow Design Challenge
• Valentines STEM Challenge – Love Bug Design Challenge
• Presidents Day STEM Challenge – Lincoln’s Cabin Challenge

March STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• St. Patrick’s Day STEM Challenge – Build a Leprechaun Trap
• Basketball Tower STEM Challenge
• St. Patrick’s Day STEM Challenge – Build a Rainbow Bridge
• New Hat for Cat Challenge Read Across America STEM

April STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Jelly Bean Tower Challenge
• Easter STEM Challenge Design a Carrot Carriage
• Earth Day STEM Challenge – Design Something Useful
• Earth Day STEM Challenge – Upcycled Birdhouse

May STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Design a New Droid
• Paper Airplane Design Challenge
• Pipe Cleaner Challenge
• Lighthouse Design Challenge

June STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Foil Boat Design Challenge
• Giant Pyramid Challenge
• Steamboat Design Challenge
• Zip Line Design Activity

July STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• House of Cards Challenge
• Doghouse Design Challenge
• Alien Spacecraft Challenge
• Airplane Design Challenge

August STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Building Block Tower Challenge
• Index Card Skyscraper Challenge
• Paper Table Challenge
• BONUS Building Block Challenge MEGA PACK

September STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Apple Boat Challenge
• Pencil Tower Challenge
• Totem Pole Challenge
• Balloon Tower Challenge

October STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Spider Web Design Challenge
• Witch’s Parachute Halloween STEM Challenge
• Bony Bridge Challenge
• Sugar Cube Arch Challenge

November STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Parade Balloon Challenge
• Thanksgiving Table Challenge
• Cranberry Tower Challenge
• Pilgrim Shelter Challenge

December STEM Challenge Bundle with Close Reading

• Cardboard Reindeer Challenge
• Funky Christmas Ornament Challenge
• Straw Christmas Tree Challenge
• Christmas Tree Tower

BUILDING BLOCK CHALLENGES

• Build a Dinosaur
• Build a Nation’s Flag
• Design a New Bug
• Build the Eiffel Tower
• Design a Superhero
• Design a Toilet Paper Dispenser
• Design a Cactus Paperweight
• Build a UFO
• Build a Treasure Chest
• Design a Totem Pole

ADDITIONAL STEM CHALLENGES

• 100th Day of School Glasses
• 100th Day of School Crayon Tower
• Kingdom Hearts Valentines Castle
• Candy Heart Tower
• Design a Candy Box

How We Used This and Our Thoughts:

My daughters who are 10 and 8 and I had fun together doing four of these projects. We picked out four that looked like the most fun and that we had the materials at home for. We did the Earth Day STEM Challenge – Upcycled Birdhouse, Foil Boat Design Challenge, Building Block Tower Challenge, and Design a New Bug Building Block Challenge. In my family we love doing STEM activities!

I really like that these STEM projects have reading and writing assignments as well. This enriches the learning experience even more and gets the students minds thinking about all the aspects of the challenge. Each STEM activity has a PDF with a QR code to scan with your code reading electronic device or link to click on to get to the reading passage. The reading assignment has comprehension questions to answer after the passage is read. The pages also had my daughters ask, imagine, plan, create, and improve upon the design they made. They were asked to research, test out their design, and make improvements on it if needed. They were also asked to show their steps and write what went well and what they could improve upon.

Zari's Birdhouse STEM Challenge.

  
Earth Day STEM Challenge – Upcycled Birdhouse
We were told to gather recyclable items up and build a bird house with them. There was a page in the PDF that had the design challenge, design criteria, material suggestions, and a little about the final project. The assignment had Zari read a passage about birds flying south during the winter then answer the comprehension questions. Then she designed and built her birdhouse using the materials we had gathered up around our home. This PDF had pictures of other people's projects for examples as well which was very helpful. Zari built her birdhouse much like the picture of the one in the PDF made out of a coffee container.

Foil Boat STEM Challenge.

Foil Boat Design Challenge
We were told to design and build a boat using only a 12" X 18" sheet of aluminum foil and see how many pennies it could hold before it sank in the water and try to build one to hold the most pennies before sinking. This one had a QR code and link as well, but we noticed that the link in the PDF didn't link to the right url for the questions so instead we had to search in the search bar for the correct webpage. Thankfully we found it using the heading on the question sheet for the design challenge reading. I am not sure if the QR code works because I do not own a device that can read those. After reading the passage about life saving boats they answered the comprehension questions. Then they designed and built their boats using the foil and proceeded to place pennies one by one on their crafts, counting them until they sunk. This PDF had pictures of other people's projects for examples as well which was very helpful. Zari's boat was rectangular and flat on the bottom it held the 210 pennies that we had without issue. Teela's boat held the 210 pennies for a moment then started taking on water. Her boat didn't have as solid of sides as Zari's.

Building Block Tower Stem Challenge

Building Block Tower Challenge
We were told to build the tallest tower out of Legos to be able to support a tennis ball. We unfortunately didn't own a tennis ball so we used an orange instead. The reading assignment was How tall is the Eiffel Tower?. The link worked great in this one and went to the correct page. After reading the passage about the Eiffel Tower they answered the comprehension questions. Then they designed and built their towers using the Legos we had and proceeded to place the orange at the top to see how well they built it. This PDF had pictures of other people's projects for examples as well which was very helpful. Teela's tower was a little taller than Zari's in this activity, but they both held the orange without toppling over.

Design a New Bug
We were told to build a new bug out of Legos. The reading assignment was Are You Scared of Bugs?. The link worked great in this one and went to the correct page. After reading the passage about bugs they answered the comprehension questions. Then they designed and built their bugs using the Legos we had. This PDF did not have pictures of other people's projects for examples.

These activities were lots of fun and some were more challenging than others. Both Teela and Zari had fun with the STEM projects. The written assignments were a little more advanced for Zari, so I told her she could write less. I highly recommend these though because they cover so many subjects in one project and my kids enjoyed them.

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Learning Resources STEM Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity Set Review #learningresources

Learning Resources STEM Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity Set is a fun toy that teaches sequencing, coding, and programming. This toy challenges players to sharpen their analytical thinking, critical thinking, logical thinking, and problem solving skills. For ages 5 and up and grades Kindergarten and up.

STEM

• Science: exploring the science of coding and programming with hands-on activities!
• Technology: building and using tools for amazing discoveries!
• Engineering: designing solutions for real-world problems!
• Math: measuring, recording, and comparing data to draw conclusions!

83 Piece Set Includes:

• 1 Robot mouse named Colby: has a switch on the bottom with 3 positions (off and two speeds: normal to use on plastic maze base grid pieces and hyper for use on carpet and other more uneven surfaces). Colorful buttons on top make him do things in the order they are pressed and are: forward (blue arrow that points towards his nose, makes him move forward 5"), rotate right (purple arrow that points right when he is facing away from you, makes Colby rotate right 90 degrees), reverse (yellow arrow that points towards his tail end, makes him move backward 5"), rotate left (orange arrow that points left when he is facing away from you, makes Colby rotate left 90 degrees), action (red circle that makes him either: move forward and back, squeak loudly, or chirp 3 times with lit up eyes), clear (yellow circle clears all coding if you make a mistake or want to do another sequence, has confirmation tone), go (green circle that is the last command to be pressed when the sequence (up to 40 steps) is completed and Colby is set down on the maze). Takes 3 AAA batteries, not included.
• 16 Plastic maze base grid pieces: connect together to form a larger board or any configuration that goes together.
• 22 Plastic maze walls: to be placed around the grids in the crevices so that the mouse can go through the maze to get to the cheese.
• 3 Plastic tunnels: can be placed on the grid or surface for the mouse to go under and through.
• 1 Plastic cheese wedge: to be placed at the end of the maze for the mouse to find. This is magnetic and sticks to the mouses nose when touched by it.
• 30 Double-sided coding cards: have one side with just the arrow and the other side with the mouse and the arrow. These help you plot and track the mouse's path and order in which the code needs to be pressed on Colby for him to get to the cheese in the maze.
• 10 Double-sided activity cards: help you build the mazes from pictures on the cards. These are made in order of difficulty, 1 being the easiest and 20 being the hardest.
• 1 Multilingual activity guide: is instructions and directions for how to play.

How To Play:

1. Pick an activity card with one of the challenge mazes.
2. Build your maze from the picture on the card or just build your own: by connecting the maze grid pieces together and adding the walls, tunnels, and cheese.
3. Use either side of the coding cards to create a step-by-step path for Colby to find the cheese.
4. Program the sequence of steps with the buttons on the mouse.
5. Set Colby down where he is suppose to start in the maze, press go, and watch Colby race to find the cheese.

Teela and Zari playing with the Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity Set.

What We Thought:
My daughters who are 6 and 8 tried out the Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity Set. This is a neat toy. It teaches some very important skills and I love that it is educational and that my girls enjoyed it so much. We love bringing this toy out for when we need a break from book work during homeschooling. The girls liked making their own mazes and figuring out what code to program into Colby, the mouse. They also thought that it was funny that the mouse made little sounds occasionally and loved that you could program an action into it to make the mouse do random things. Someday we'd love to get the purple mouse, Jack, that is sold separately, so we can have even more fun with this set and race the two!

The Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity Set is fun and educational! I recommend it to people that love games, puzzles, and educational toys! This is also a great addition to any homeschool environment. It is a great family centered toy and wonderful to teach and improve STEM and mental skills.

BUY IT


DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I received this product for free to facilitate this review. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for doing this review. Affiliate links can be found in this post. Thank you for your support of this blog!

Learning Resources Mental Blox 360° 3-D Building Game Review

Learning Resources Mental Blox 360° 3-D Building Game is a game of 3-D shapes that the player tries to stack and place in formation to resemble a 2-D picture. These brain-boosting puzzles challenge players to sharpen their spatial visualization, critical thinking, logical thinking, and problem solving skills. It takes concentration, attention to detail, logical thinking, abstract thinking, analytical thinking, and precision to build and solve 3-D shape puzzles from the different visual perspectives and points-of-view. You can play by yourself or with friends or family members for even more fun. For ages 5 and up.

Everything included in the box.

What Is Included:

• 15 colorful plastic blocks: These blocks are best played with on a hard flat surface is optimal with these so they stack well. These are sized well for little hands to grasp.
• 40 double-sided cards: These feature the puzzle on the front and the solution on the back. The picture cards show a 2-D viewpoint to be built in 3-D. The cards are language-free so players who do not read yet can still play. 3 levels of play: green cards are easy, yellow are medium, and red is difficult. Top right of the card has a cube that is representative of which point of view or angle is being shown (top, front, behind, sides). Left of the line on the card is all pieces needed t make the build. Right of the line is how the structure looks when completed from the point of view indicated in the above cube. Check accuracy on the back of each card.
• Activity Guide: This is the instruction booklet. It describes how to play the game.

Teela and Zari playing with the Mental Blox 360° 3-D Building Game.

What We Thought:
My daughters who are 5 and 8 tried out the Mental Blox 360° 3-D Building Game. This game makes them think outside the blox :) My eight year old daughter could do the green and yellow cards without difficulty. She was challenged on the red cards, but quite willing and up to the challenge without giving up. My five year old couldn't quite grasp the concept of the different viewpoints so she instead stacks the blocks in fun ways. Mental Blox 360° is a great boredom buster. It helps expand my kids' ways of thinking. I am quite amazed at how much attention they pour into this game. It keeps them very occupied for quite a while.

Mental Blox 360° is fun and educational! I recommend it to people that love brain games, puzzles, and other games! This is also a great addition to any homeschool environment. It is a great family centered game and wonderful to teach and improve STEM and mental skills.

BUY IT


DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I received this product for free to facilitate this review. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for doing this review. Affiliate links can be found in this post. Thank you for your support of this blog!

Fun Experiments and Family STEM Night at Lower Columbia College in Longview Washington

Friday, September 26, 2014 my husband and I took our girls to a Family STEM Night at Lower Columbia College in Longview Washington. STEM education is teaching and learning about Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. It is hands-on and so much fun! I love to include this type of learning in my homeschooling. Teela had been excited to go all week because she saw a handout with information on it.

We got there a little late, but it was going to be going from 4pm to 8pm so we actually were fine. We met in the Student Center and spread out to different areas of the campus from there.They handed out a map which had each station listed and well marked so we could find our way around. Hands-on learning activities included: Marshmallow Catapults, Make Your Own Slime, Sink Your Boat, Electric Play-Doh, SubZero Demonstration, Reptile Roadshow, Fire Truck Crawl, Alka-Seltzer Rocket Cannons, Ocean in a Bottle, etc.

Community participants included:

• Lower Columbia College
• STEM Fest
• Fibre Federal Credit Union
• Weyerhaeuser
• Longview Police
• Longview Fire Department
• Reptile Road Show
• Tula Yoga
• Lower Columbia School Gardens
• OnTheMark Associates
• Port of Longview
• Panda Express Panda Cares Foundation
• SubZero Ice Cream

Making catapults to launch mini marshmallows.

My daughters made marshmallow catapults with rubber bands, Popsicle sticks and  a plastic spoon. Teela tried to launch them into her mouth. The instructions on how to make the marshmallow catapult can be found on DevinCollier.com.

Fun with Slime.

DIY Slime

Ingredients and Additional Items Needed:

• Elmer's white glue (for opaque slime) or Elmer's school glue gel (for translucent slime)
• Borax (find in the laundry detergent aisle of the store)
• Water
• Two bowls
• Food coloring (optional)

Instructions:

• In one bowl mix ½ cup (4 oz) glue and ½ cup water.
• Add food coloring if you want colored slime.
• In the other bowl, mix 1 tsp borax with 1 cup water until the borax is dissolved.
• Add the glue mixture to the borax solution, stirring slowly.
• The slime will begin to form immediately; stir as much as you can, then dig in and knead it with your hands until it gets less sticky. (No one makes slime without getting a little messy!)
• Don't worry about any leftover water in the bowl; just pour it out.

Science behind the Slime:

The glue has an ingredient called polyvinyl acetate, which is a liquid polymer. The borax links the polyvinyl acetate molecules to each other, creating one large, flexible polymer. This kind of slime will get stiffer and more like putty the more you play with it. Store it in a plastic bag in the fridge, to keep it from growing mold.

Boat sinking 101

We had fun shaping tin foil boats, floating them in a plastic tub with water in it, and filling the boats we made with various items to try and sink them. We answered the questions: Why do some things sink and others float? and How does the shape of something affect its ability to float? We learned the properties of: hydrodynamics, fluid dynamics, buoyancy, upthrust, gravity, density, volume, mass, water displacement, and the Archimedes' Principle.

Making a circuit with Play-Doh

DIY Electric Play Dough (Play-Doh)

The idea of adding electricity to play dough to make play dough creations have light, sound, and motion was developed by Samuel Johnson and Dr. AnneMarie Thomas of the St. Thomas Lab at the University of St. Thomas. Dr. Thomas and her researchers wanted to introduce circuits to young kids. In their research they discovered that salt dough was a great conductor and sugar dough was a solid insulator. They called their invention Squishy Circuits.

Ingredients and Additional Items Needed:

• conductive dough (click here for recipe)
• insulating dough (click here for recipe)
• battery pack
• batteries
• light emitting diodes (LEDs)

The last 3 items you can get from your local electronics store or you can order a kit online at squishycircuitsstore.com.

If you're assembling everything yourself, pick up some spade terminals while you're at the store and crimp them to the end of the wires. Click here to see how.

Simple Circuit Instructions:

• When you have all the materials together and set up you can have your child start by making a simple circuit. The circle of circuitry will create a closed circuit and the light will turn on if done properly.
• Give your child two pieces of the conductive dough.
• Have them make a ball with each piece setting them on a surface apart.
• Let your child place one wire from the battery pack into one ball and the other wire from the batter pack into the other ball. Make sure the two pieces of dough don't touch each other.
• Your child can now close the circuit by placing a wire from the LED into each piece of dough. If the LED doesn't light up, have your child flip it around. LEDs only allow energy to flow in one direction.
• Success! Your child has just made a simple circuit and the light should turn on.
• Now have your child remove a piece from the circuit, either one of the battery pack wires or one of the LED wires. The light will go out. This creates a open or broken circuit. The energy/electricity can't flow.
• Have your child put the circuit back together so the light comes on again. Have them move the dough pieces closer to each other. This makes the light go out and is called a short circuit. To fix the short circuit take a piece of insulating dough and put it between the conductive dough. The light will shine again.

Vocabulary Words:

• Electricity
• Squishy Circuit
• Circuit
• Conductor
• Insulator
• Battery
• Positive
• Negative
• Closed circuit
• Open circuit
• Short circuit

You can amp up the fun even more and get even more creative with the dough. Have your kids sculpt the dough into different things and use the lights as eyes for animals, etc. You can get more ideas online if you do a search for circuit dough. Once your child has the simple circuit concept down you can teach series circuits, parallel circuits and voltage to them.

Yummy food from Panda Express and Panda Cares Foundation.

Panda Express Panda Cares Foundation and SubZero Ice Cream provided free food and refreshments for participants.

SubZero Ice Cream

The SubZero Ice Cream was in the next building over so after we ate our dinner from Panda Express we headed over there to get a taste and see what other things we could do. SubZero uses liquid nitrogen to make their ice cream really cold. It instantly freezes the custom ice cream to temperatures of -321 degrees Fahrenheit. It was really fun to watch them make ice cream out of ingredients and a billowing cloud of "smoke".  It was very entertaining watching them make it and my kids loved the show as much as the ice cream.

Reptile Roadshow

My daughters had fun seeing and learning about all the reptiles and some arachnids from the Reptile Roadshow that came to Family STEM Night. They got to pet one of the tortoises while they were there.

The wonderful world of microscopes.

The Lower Columbia Gardens was also there handing out free packets of seeds. They told Teela and Zari they could each take 4 different ones. They also had microscopes set up to view the wonderful world of the microscopic. All of us got to see up close live earth worms in composted soil, a cross-section of a bee's head (that is the little speck on the one Teela is admiring in the second picture above), and a sunflower. It was really amazing how cool they all looked under the microscope. It got me wishing I had one like theirs for homeschool use. Maybe someday :)

Making the Ocean in a Bottle.

DIY Ocean in a Bottle

Ingredients and Additional Items Needed:

• 1 small water bottle with the label taken off (You can use other clear plastic bottles if you add 2/3 water to them. If you use a clear mouthwash bottle the lid is childproof.)
• cooking oil (we used vegetable oil)
• blue food coloring
• glitter and small shells (optional)
• funnel
• hot glue (If your lid isn't child proof you may want to add a bead of hot glue around it on the inside before tightening it after everything is added to the bottle.)

Instructions:

• drink down or dump out approximately 1/3 of the water in the bottle. There should be at least 2/3 of the bottle filled with water still.
• add a couple drops of food coloring to the water
• tighten cap and swirl gently to mix food coloring with water
• uncap and add glitter and small shells
• using the funnel add oil to top off the bottle
• tighten lid and tip bottle from side to side and upside down to make a rocking ocean motion

Science behind the Ocean in a Bottle:

Oil and water don't mix. This all comes down to chemistry. Everything is made of tiny particles called molecules. Water molecules are dense and polar. Polar means they have a small positive charge at one end and a small negative charge at the other end, and they stick to each other. Oil molecules are non-polar meaning they have no charge. Because of this, oil molecules are more attracted to each other than to water molecules, and water molecules are more attracted to each other than to oil molecules. It may seem like the oil and water are mixing when you shake or swirl the bottle, but if you set it down again the oil will always rise to the top because it is also less dense than the water.

Alka-Seltzer Rocket Cannons

DIY Alka-Seltzer Rocket Cannons

Ingredients and Additional Items Needed:

• one empty 35mm plastic film canister and lid. These are getting harder to find, but stores that develop film should have some. (The white canisters work much better than the black ones do.)
• one fizzing antacid tablet
• water
• safety goggles

Instructions:

• put on safety goggles and go outside to do this experiment
• break antacid tablet in half
• remove the lid and place 1 tsp (5 mL) of water into the canister

Do the next 2 steps quickly!!

• drop the tablet half into the canister and snap the cap onto the canister (make sure that it snaps on tightly)
• quickly put the canister on the ground CAP SIDE DOWN and STEP BACK at least 2 meters
• About 10 seconds later, you will hear a POP! and the film canister will launch into the air!

Caution: If it does not launch, wait at least 30 second before examining the canister. Usually the cap is not on tight enough and the build up of gas leaked out.

Science behind the Alka-Seltzer Rocket Cannons:

When you add water it starts to dissolve the antacid tablet making a gas called carbon dioxide. When the canister is capped the carbon dioxide gas builds up inside creating pressure as more and more is released. Finally there is so much pressure that the cap is pushed down and popped off with so much force that the canister goes flying up. This is called thrust. Real rockets use their rocket fuel to blast off much in the same way.

You can take the experiment one step further by adding fins and a nose cone made out of paper to the canister to try to control the path of the rocket cannons better. Also you could add some different colored tempera paint to the water and make exploding art on a large sheet of paper like this blog did.

Fire Fighters, Fire Trucks, and Police Cruisers.

Last but not least, Teela and Zari got to meet some awesome fire fighters all dressed up in their gear. They also got to sit inside a fire truck and police cruiser. So cool!

The evening was really fun and we got to learn some neat things along the way. I am glad we got to go and share the experience with all of you!

DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER:  I did not receive any special incentives or compensation for posting this. I just wanted to share my evening with my readers.