Sunday, April 3, 2011

Quizboards at MIT

The Edgerton Center at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology offers free project-based classes to school groups.  This year our entire co-op and another homeschool family took part in the Quizboards program.  Kids used a template to create quiz questions at home.  The Edgerton staff then gave them the cardboard frame, wires, and paper fasteners so that, with a bit of soldering (the highlight of the class) they created their Quizboards.

The finished board has two alligator clips.  One you hold next to the question, the other you touch to your selected answer.  If it is correct then the small bulb on the clip lights up.

The Center offers classes for a variety of age groups; the Quizboards are for 9 and up. While the older kids were there, the younger kids walked around the MIT campus with some of the parents. Afterward we traveled two miles up the road to the Boston Museum of Science. On Fridays the museum has a light visitor volume and is open until 9 pm. The kids especially like wandering around the museum with their friends. We had a full and wonderful day of science!


2 comments:

Unknown said...

Speaking of MIT, did you see that they are partnering with the Smithsonian for an 8 wk online mystery science game for middle grades? Here is the link in case you are interested. I signed up, but know very little about it except for what is here.

http://cms.mit.edu/news/2011/02/vanished_smithsonian_and_mit_l.php

Kris said...

Shannon, I have the site bookmarked but I haven't had a chance to look it over yet. I'm going ot post it on the AHS Yahoo Group to see if anyone else has looked yet. Thanks for reminding me!