Inclined Planes are More Fun Than You Might Think...

When Francine and I get together to plan curriculum, we usually start by asking "What have the kids been passionate about/obsessed with lately." This time around, the resounding (but not surprising) answer was cars and trucks.

Cars and trucks are a perennial item in the Frog room. We may switch off the size and type of vehicle, but you can always find wheels close at hand.

We have nothing against simply rolling cars along the floor, but we figured it was time to expand everyone's horizons a little bit...

The addition of this wooden garage helped to point us in the right direction. Hang onto your hats, it's time to explore some inclined planes!!!

An inclined plane is one of the six simple machines as defined by Renaissance scientists. According to our good friend Wikipedia, simple machines are "the simplest mechanisms that use mechanical advantage (also called leverage) to multiply force"

For example, a dump truck uses leverage to move it's payload (in this case, plastic cows) from the hopper to the dumping ground.

Leonardo Da'Vinci's fantastic inventions were all based on simple machines.

Because simple machines are...well...simple, they are easy to make and offer many hands on opportunities to explore concepts in engineering, mathematics and physics.

Also, when you "multiply force" you can make things go FAST, which is super fun!

As soon as we decided to start purposefully playing with inclined planes in our classroom, we noticed that they are everywhere!
Ramps...

Slides...

Ladders...

We're having too much fun with simple machines to stop with inclined planes. Next up? Pulleys!!!