Customer Reviews

Super Smart: Science

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Colleen Kessler, an intervention specialist for students in grades 2-3, shares her wisdom and experience in Super Smart Science: 180 Days to Warm-Ups and Challenging Activities, a compendium of activities and science experiments meant to stir students' interest and expand their scientific knowledge. Each day's suggestions opens with an inspirational "thought for the day" quote, followed by a cool fact. The rest of the recommendation can take the form of a sample activity kids can do with everyday materials, or a teaser story problem with a solution. "Teaser: Why don't you feel or see a mosquito bite until after it starts itching? Solution: The mosquito bites by inserting her lancets into the capillary beds beneath the skin, and drinks by lubricating her mouth with saliva. The saliva acts as an anesthetic and contains an anticoagulant that causes an allergic reaction in humans - hence the bump and redness." Recommended activities include making a simple compass, having students try to be "human stopwatches" to see how good they are at estimating time, to making raisins "dance" on carbonated water since the carbon dioxide in the water tends to collect on their uneven surfaces. Highly recommended as an adaptable, easy-to-use supplement to elementary school science instruction.

Beware, this book contains incorrect nonsense about equal transit-time regarding air moving over a wing: "...whether the air goes over or under the wing, it arrives at the other side of the wing at the same instant." This is just factually wrong. Look up Equal Transit-Time Fallacy for more information.