Appy Hour at Local Elementary School's GATE Club

-

On Thursday morning I was a guest at a local school's GATE Club meeting to present some of the apps that we have on our iPads at the library. I brought our collection of 11 iPads with me, along with some handouts and the cable to connect one iPad to their projector. Then I gave kids a quick overview of each app (I chose apps that were STEM-related this time) and allowed the kids to play with the iPads for fifteen minutes before they had to leave for class.

Here are the apps we covered:

Science

Monster Heart Medic - Free - Explores the cardiovascular system and gives you an interactive game helping a monster to achieve a healthier life. iOS, Android, Amazon.

Stephen Hawking's Snapshots of the Universe - $1.99 - Explore concepts about gravity, relativity, and how the universe works while playing challenges that stimulate your curiosity to learn more. iOS.

NAMOO - Wonders of Plant Life - $3.99 - This stunning and visually engrossing app teaches students about plant biology and makes processes like photosynthesis and capillary action easier to understand. iOS, Android, Amazon.

iBiome Wetland - $2.99 – Play a game that teaches you step by step about the wetland biome and the way ecosystems work. iOS.

Shout Science! - Free - A comic-book style app with in-depth stories about three different scientists who changed the way we see the world. iOS.

Arloon Solar System - $2.99 - Great visual explanations of how Earth’s orbit, the moon’s orbit, the Earth’s axis and other mechanisms of our solar system actually work. iOS, Android.

Technology

The Everything Machine - $2.99 - iOS. Like a LittleBits kit that is completely digital, you learn concepts about electrical circuits and mechanical devices while hacking your iPad and making it do wonderful new things. iOS.

Engineering

Rube Works - $2.99 - Solve puzzles and make complex, funny Rube Goldberg machines. Promotes creativity and critical thinking as well as Common Core science skills. iOS, Android, Amazon.

Monster Physics - $1.99 - Learn about simple machines and build your own invention. iOS.

Math

Math Angle – Free - Hands-on activities for reinforcing the concepts of acute & obtuse angles and estimating degrees. iOS.

Find more great apps for kids at http://www.pinterest.com/pasadenalibrary!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bat Signals

-
Image
I'm doing a craft project for Batman's 75th Anniversary where the kids are going to make Bat Signals out of Pringles cans. I had two different kinds of Pringles cans: a short one and a long one. I wanted to see, which can produced a clearer bat signal when an LED keychain flashlight was placed inside? Well, the first thing I had to do was construct a "stand" for the flashlight so that it would shine directly upwards. It kept falling down, ruining the effect! I cut out two circles (using the Pringles lid as a guide) of cardstock, glued them together so that they would be sturdy, and folded them into a semicircle shape. With the fold I cut some slits going outward in a kind of star formation so that the flashlight could poke through. Then I taped all around and underneath. Finally, I cut a few more slits around the outer circumference of my circle and bent the sides down like a hexagon to make it into a "stand." Worked quite well and I don't fors
Read more

Citizen Science Kids Can Do at Home

-
Today marks the 55th day since schools closed in California. Although state and local governments are working to put a reopening plan into action, schools are going to remain closed for the rest of this 2019-2020 school year, and summer programs are likely going to have difficulty reopening too. So what are kids to do? We have all these children with sharp eyes and brilliant minds, and not much to use them on apart from video games. Enter Citizen Science! As citizen scientists, kids can use their mental energy (and Internet bandwidth) to work toward furthering a good cause like studying wildlife in remote regions of the globe, tracking climate change, learning about distant galaxies, or discovering underlying causes of diseases to move researchers closer to finding treatments.  So today I gave a webinar highlighting my personal favorite citizen science projects for kids to try. There are thousands of projects out there, and I must have played at least a few dozen of them before
Read more

Exploring the Night Sky: Astronomy Festival for All Ages

-
Image
On Thursday, February 27, we had a special astronomy festival for the whole family! People of all ages got to learn something new and inspiring about the way our understanding of the universe has grown, and also the ways that you can help scientists track changes in night sky visibility. Globe At Night Neighborhood Science Kit When Los Angeles Public Library got a grant for bringing Neighborhood Science to other libraries, Pasadena was chosen as one of the first libraries to get their Neighborhood Science kits. There are currently five Neighborhood Science kits  at Pasadena that you can check out and use to conduct observations and collect data that will help scientists understand more about the way our climate is changing, our air and water quality is changing, etc. The Globe At Night kit  includes a Sky Quality Meter for measuring the darkness in your area, and other tools and information. You can use a Sky Quality Meter to get a reading of the sky's level of darkness, and t
Read more