The science of flight

[momo3boys]

We unschool our science and My alomst 9 yo, son, who is very hard to get interested in science, wants to learn about planes. Any good ideas? We've read about the Wright brothers, but I'm looking for some hands-on, inexpensive things that he can do to really understand the science behind it.

[Miyu]

Check out this site:

http://www.cdli.ca/CITE/flightsc.htm


about 3/4 of the way down, there is a section on activities that kids can do...they look pretty good at first glance...there are also teacher's resources at the bottom of the page...

[momo3boys]

Great Site! I love the experiments and I'm sure my DS will too.

[Lenethren]

Thanks for that link.

[Aspie]

Actually, I think I might know where to get hold of someone who knows a lot about planes if you'd like me to try?

[MNKristy]

Just what I needed...thanks! My son just asked me yesterday if we could study about airplanes. This is just what I needed.

[Aspie]

Just what I needed...thanks! My son just asked me yesterday if we could study about airplanes. This is just what I needed.

I believe I may be able get hold of someone who is obessed with planes, if you don't mind rambling. Let me know, kay?

[Janet Tatman]

My husband loved birds of prey and flight and instilled a love of them into our children - we spent the money to take them up in a small, private plane for a flight - expensive, but it left an impression.

Also, to truly understand design with lift/drag ratios, etc. we built gliders out of balsa wood or styrofoam and flew them off the top of our barn.

Also, powered flight lovers may want to built a radio controled model planes or helicopters.

[Mark]

those are excellent suggestions Janet,

I think I'll put them into action for the coming school session this
Spring.

The real shame is that I missed this earlier in the year.


Hey Aspie... rambling on about planes is a good thing too..
there is a lot of ground to cover in the subject of flight.
From natural to gliders to motorized to rotary...


Mark

[Aspie]

Hey Aspie... rambling on about planes is a good thing too..
there is a lot of ground to cover in the subject of flight.
From natural to gliders to motorized to rotary...

Yes, the people I know could probably make a ramble for each bolt.

[cdprop]

I have an idea that might make a cool experiment. If you take a fan that is reasonably well-powered, you use it as sort of a wind tunnel. Then, you can take styrofoam and make different shapes with it, to see which shapes provide the most lift.

[keptwoman]

Hi, my son also wanted to learn about flight and I didn't really know where to start.
I have purchased a Hands of a Child flight lapbooking kit to guide me, after having a quick look through it, it doesn't give me the answers but it does at least provide me with a format and a list of things that we should look at.
History of flight
Biography on the Wright brothers there is actually a guy in New Zealand who is believed to have flown before the Wrights, so we will study him too. http://www.nzedge.com/heroes/pearse.html
The main parts of an airplane that aid flight
The aerodynamic forces involved
A paper airplane experiment.

It all looks reasonable to me, I just need to get my behind to the library to get out some books because we begin on Monday

[Mark]

then ya better hurry..

[jessgray]

you could tie gravity into learning about flight too just a thought.