Recent content by fowl_bob

Error analysis would have to be simplified to teach 8-9 year old students but taking very simple problems would be very important to promote critical thinking about accuracy. I am well aware of the errors I have made in the past relying on sampling periods that were too short or long or out of...

This was part of my initial lesson. Using hands, fingers, feet and any other body parts that are easy to place on an item, I learned in Boy Scouts. Using the Story Stick is from Woodworking. You can translate any measurement to a Story Stick to collect measurements before recording them in a...

Thanks for the referral. I may get lost just looking and reading.

Thanks for the reminder. I do want to teach the kids using projects that are as close to their daily lives as possible that way they may be hooked on the method of learning. If they sell finger puppets on e-bay they have to know what shipping costs are to make a profit. If they like to sell...

You bring up a very good point. Based on some recent research work with old manuscripts, it appears that Archimedes well understood and worked on this topic and may very well have discovered a calculus centuries before Newton. I won't try to teach that because the fragments of existing...

I have been concerned about how to keep things simple. The objective is to teach the idea of measuring things. Your spring/ruler suggestion is perfectly valid. It is simple and can be used to teach the idea of measuring.

A coathanger balance scale is the quickest way I know of to weigh small items.

My experience with the kindergarten exercise leads me to agree that any age could be appropriate as long as the ideas are framed in a way that teaches the material and also keeps their attention. Fun projects work the best. Our third/fourth grade class recently worked on "Sound". Instruments...

First of all, you must stick to the facts, as you remember them. You do not have to accuse the student who assualted the intruder of performing anything that can be considered a crime. If other students want to do that, they can. Use your words to be as general as necessary to describe what...

By the way (recent translation of BTW). I had a good teaching experience during Dinosaur Week at the school. My wife and I were assisting the Kindergarten teacher. My station was the dig site. The students were to examine the site of buried bones (a chocolate chip cookie) and record their...

Good idea. I am familiar with metric and its benefits. I retired from Siemens. When I work on carpentry or structural maintenance, it drives me crazy to not easily add the widths and thicknesses of panels and trim or to decide on proportions by dividing fractions in my head. I got spoiled at...

Thanks for the reminder. I had notices from my FB friends that day.

Starting in 3rd. More advanced work could be as late as 6th or 7th. The 2nd graders picked up on the practical measurements easily. That included using the story stick, fingers, hands and outstretched arms for various units, measuring items like books, tables, doorways, recording them and...

I will try to give you a start. First, document your application requirements. Topics should "what" the application requires. It is usually expressed as the functions expected of a system in the view of an actor outside of the system (customer, operator, maintainer). Ex: Move the robot...

OK I'm recording this. How many ways can one calculate PI? Good idea with the spokes. Some unborn student may get the benefit of that some day.