Electric Circuits

On of the great memories I have from middle school science is learning about electric circuits. We would go to the lab room and get to fiddle around with all of the wires, batteries, light-bulbs, and whatever else there was at our disposal.  I knew when I got to this unit, that I would have to let my kids enjoy the same experimental freedom.  There is more power in doing the science than in reading about it.

For this unit, I always have a little lesson at the beginning, then sometimes a little worksheet to make sure they are understanding.  Afterwards, they have their little experiment they have to do.  If they are done, I let them play around with the materials before the end of class.

Oooh . . Science!
Apologies for my lame phone picture quality

We have done the following experiments:

1. Conductors and Insulators –DAY 1
2. Build a simple circuit –DAY 2

• Materials:
• A battery (no battery holders), 
• A free light bulb, 
• simple wires (no alligator clips) 
• Make the light bulb turn on, then draw your circuit and label the following:
• Conductor
• Insulator
• Power Source
• Light Bulb 
• (the gen-ed classes labeled this as "resistor."  I did not worry about that term with my kids. I wanted them to focus on "conductor" and "insulator" and understanding how a circuit works.)

3. Build a working series circuit –DAY 3

    Build a working parallel circuit –DAY 3

• Materials:
• 2 batteries (with battery holders)
• 2 light bulbs
• wires (with alligator clips)
• 1 switch
• Make the light bulbs turn on, then draw your circuits and label the following in each circuit
• Conductor
• Insulator
• Power Source
• Light Bulb **see note above
• Switch

5. Exploration with series and parallel circuits –DAY 4

• The lesson I had at the beginning of this class was two fold: review series and parallel circuits and practice drawing circuits correctly using symbols.  We used the mini white boards for this lesson so each kid could practice drawing the circuit instead of just watching me draw it. 

• For this experiment I wanted them to continue solidifying series and parallel circuits and to play around with the variables in a circuit.  How do you get a light bulb brighter? What happens when you have a lot of wires?  I had them follow this worksheet to get going.  The kids could go at their own pace on this one, which is what I loved about it.  For those who finished fast, I had a challenge circuit for them to build for extra credit.