Plastic Egg Genetics

April 10, 2020
Donna Giachetti, Educational Innovations

By Donna Giachetti

Never doubt our slogan, Teachers Serving Teachers®.  It’s the reason we come to work every day, and it’s certainly the reason for this blog.  On any given day, we actively search the Internet for nifty, new science gizmos, exciting new science discoveries, and as-yet-undiscovered (by us) teachers in the trenches of today’s classrooms.  We love exploring other teachers’ science blogs, videos, and lessons—and we send fan mail applauding their work more often than you might imagine. 

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Leave a Comment » | About Us, Biology, Elementary level, High School level, life science, Middle School level | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Donna Giachetti

Gyrocopter Lesson

January 29, 2015

Tami O'Connor, Educational Innovationsby: Tami O’Connor

As an elementary and middle school teacher and Girl Scout leader, I had a bag of tricks that I dug into frequently…  One of my favorites was the gyrocopter.  I always kept a template in my files and when teaching about air, friction, forces symmetry or flight, out it came.  It was simple enough for kindergarten students to build, yet complex enough to hold the attention of eighth graders as we discussed principles of drag, the characteristics of flight or even just isolating variables in an experiment.

Nearly 400 years before the invention of the helicopter, Leonardo da Vinci sketched out a machine designed to compress air in order to obtain flight.  When Igor Sikorsky designed the first successful helicopter in the late 1930’s, da Vinci’s spinning wing was his inspiration.

Today, you can easily build gyrocopters with your students to explore different designs and variables.

How Does a Gyrocopter Work?

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2 Comments | Elementary level, experiments, Middle School level, Physics | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Tami O'Connor