Newton Got Things Rolling

This post correlates with Exploring Creation with Physical Science Module 10.

Kick off your study of Newton's Laws with "Newton's 3 Laws of Motion" from Disney. Unsurprisingly, you get Disney promo along with it, but it really does do a good job at discussing Newton's Laws. You can probably pick it up at the library, or buy it at Amazon. Here's the trailer.

Newton's Laws of Motion

Newton's Laws of Motion are really not that hard to understand. Motion, friction and inertia are things we experience everyday. Even a young child can understand that nothing moves without a force making it move. So teach these basic laws so that a five-year-old can understand it.  If your youngest child can grasp it, your older ones will grasp it. Once they grasp the basic thought, you can give the older ones more information to build on that simple principle.

Here's Newton's First Law for a five-year-old: Timmy, Newton said that things that aren't moving, like mommy's coffee cup, won't move unless something pushes or pulls it. We call that push or pull a force. Would you please come and pick up my coffee cup? You just applied a force to that coffee cup and made it move. Nothing in the whole world will move without a force making it move.

The second part of Newton's First Law says that objects in motion will keep moving in the same direction unless acted upon by a force. I'm going to give this lego guy a ride on the salt shaker. See, they are riding across the table together until, boom. The salt shaker bumped into the book. What happened to the lego guy? He flew off the front because there was no force to stop him.

I'm sure you catch on to the idea. The older kids are watching the younger kid and they all get it. After this you can talk about terms and any mathematical equations and fill the concept out more for the older ones while the little ones listen and play with legos or color. You can do any labs together. Watch any videos together. And then let everyone work on their grade appropriate worksheet at the same time. (The NASA link has great age appropriate worksheets to print out.)

Note:

I often see my five-year-old repeating the science demonstrations on his own. Something's sinking in.

Schedule: 

I would break Newton's Laws of Motion into three units and spend one to three days on each law. Read the textbook or explain it to them. Watch a video. Do a lab. (LABS ARE ESSENTIAL). Do a little worksheet to make sure they understand the terms and main concept.

We are also reading  Isaac Newton by Kathleen Krull . He was a pivotal character in history, so I want my kids to know about him. But this is not essential for science.

Videos on Motion

The Magic School Bus Plays Ball

Bill Nye : Motion

Worksheets on motion


worksheets on Newton's 3 laws of motion

Lectures on Newton's Laws of Motion 
from Kahn Academy

Newton's First Law

Newton's Second Law

Newton's Third Law

Links to Labs


Newton's First Law Lab

Newton's Laws of Motion from NASA

Newton's Second Law virtual lab from glencoe

Newton's Second Law Lab

Better Lab for 2nd Law