How to SMILE (Science and Math Informal Learning Educators)

How to Smile is another great free site for STEM focused hands-on-activities. From their site:

Howtosmile.org is collecting the best informal science and math education activities on the web, and creating tools to help those who teach school-aged kids in non-classroom settings.

This site is free to register and free to contribute. They have an in depth advanced search function with age, subject, material costs and even a special search by chemical. I did a quick search for Acetic acid (vinegar) and it came up with several fun experiments using this household item.

I think this resource along with Teachers Domain will be a wonderful supplement to Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding, since Blue loves hands on experiments.

 

Teachers Domain

I just found this wonderful site called Teachers Domain! Here is some information from their website:

Teachers' Domain is a free digital media service for educational use from public broadcasting and its partners. You’ll find thousands of media resources, support materials, and tools for classroom lessons, individualized learning programs, and teacher professional learning communities.

They receive major funding from the National Science Foundation and seem to have an especially rich collection of science resources. As a registered member (which is free!) you have the ability to create folders to organize your resources, by child, by topic, etc. There are also several ways to filter which I think are particularly helpful for educations: Grade Level, Content, Media Type, Permitted Use and Accessibility Features. There is also the ability to join groups and create your own groups which I have not had the opportunity to look at.

*Thanks to Only Small Things blog for posting about this fantastic site!*

Update:
It looks like the groups are for pre-formed groups, I have not figured out how to join one or create one yet. Does anyone else know anything about the group feature?

Also, Blue watched several videos and loves them! He even asked to watch one several times and then asked for the same materials they were using and did his own experiment.