A Children’s Indoor Play Activity
Does your kid think a pound of bricks weighs more than a pound of feathers? This activity can clue you into your child’s understanding of the physical world.
Materials Required:
- Dowel (3 feet) or card board tube from wrapping paper
- Wire hanger
- String
- Clay
- Strawberry or paper baskets
Instructions:
Does your kid think a pound of bricks weighs more than a pound of feathers? This activity can clue you into your child’s understanding of the physical world.
Make a scale by placing a dowel or cardboard tube across two chair seats.
Leave two feet in between. Use books to keep the dowel or tube from moving.
Place a hanger over the dowel or tube, and tie an equal length of string to the bottom of the hanger at both ends.
Put a piece of tape over the knots to keep the string from slipping.
Next, attach identical strawberry or paper baskets to the strings.
Attach bits of clay to the hanger or baskets to level the “scale.”
Have your child gather a variety of items that can be compared on the scale – say, a plastic animal and a lunch bag filled with paper strips. Or two toy trucks, roughly the same size, one wood and one metal.
Explain that the heavier item makes the scale go down further than the lighter one, and that two items that weigh the same will balance the scale.
Such is the way of nature.
This Children’s Indoor Play Activity is sponsored by Zane Education – the home of online Visual Learning.
