Spooky Particles

Third graders capped their unit on particles by presenting a special Halloween science project to first grade students this week. 

In Cecilia Owens’ third grade science class, students have been studying particles and talking about how different particles give objects different properties. Cecilia introduced students to Makey Makey invention kits that connect everyday objects to computer programs. Using the kit components of alligator clips, a circuit board, and a USB cable, third graders created circuits to help the electrons flow in a one-way path and perform different tasks like producing a sound or making something light up. 

Third graders created “Spooky Particle Drawings” as a final project to share with first-grade students. Using a Makey Makey Halloween program with various spine-chilling sound effects, each student selected three sounds as inspiration to create three different Halloween-themed drawings. Their next challenge was to find a way to connect their pictures to the Makey Makey circuit. This presented some unexpected obstacles for the third grade scientists. The Circuit Scribe pens with conductive ink did not work well, so students experimented with snap circuits to see if they would perform better. Finally, they discovered that backing each picture in aluminum foil enabled them to create reliable connectivity points in their drawings. “The trial and error process was interesting, and the students were resilient through it all,” says Cecilia. Once the circuit was connected to the drawing, students could touch a point on their Halloween drawing and produce a correspondingly eerie sound. 

After students had gotten their particle drawings to work, they reflected in writing on how the circuit worked, why specific points on the picture worked for each sound, and what they had learned about particles. On Friday, first grade students visited the third grade science classroom and had the opportunity to hear multiple students present their projects. The third graders explained how the project worked, and the first graders were excited to put on the headphones and experiment with the spook drawings. They delighted in tapping on each drawing to make a werewolf howl, hear the music from a Halloween dance party, or the cackles of a flying witch on her broomstick.